unsayable

adjective

un·​say·​able ˌən-ˈsā-ə-bəl 

: not sayable : not easily expressed or related

also : not allowed to be said

Examples of unsayable in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Well-meaning observers want to split the difference between the sayable and unsayable. — Lauren Michele Jackson, New Yorker, 8 Aug. 2026

What the novel is working toward is not the exposure of a violation, let alone the processing of any real-life event, but a recognition of the self—a self who survives the scourges of childhood, and a storytelling-self who learns that fiction can reveal otherwise unsayable truths. — Honor Jones, The Atlantic, 3 Mar. 2026

But Woolf’s broad, sweeping pronouncements about what literature is and isn’t capable of were always meant sarcastically; her life’s work, after all, was to push the boundaries of literature so as to say the unsayable. — Literary Hub, 9 Dec. 2025

All fair, but an uncomfortable couch and a passion for the art of the unsayable are not reasons enough to kill oneself. — Rafaela Bassili, Vulture, 29 Oct. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1870, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for unsayable

• payable
• playable
• repayable