How to Use masterly in a Sentence

masterly

adjective

• She did a masterly job of organizing the conference.
• Then there was his masterly comic rhythm, an old school rat-a-tat that got right to the point.
  — Jason Zinoman, New York Times, 11 May 2020
• Merritt’s oil-on-paper technique can be masterly, and his eye doesn’t just dwell on the surface.
  — Michael Upchurch, The Seattle Times, 6 June 2017
• Aciman’s novel is a masterly portrayal of arousal and the selves forged by passion.
  — Joumana Khatib, New York Times, 19 Jan. 2018
• This has long been the stuff of Don DeLillo’s masterly fiction.
  — David Marchesephoto Illustration By Bráulio Amado, New York Times, 11 Oct. 2020
• Yet Green was a masterly player and composer who was uniquely diverse in his range of styles.
  — Martin Johnson, WSJ, 17 Apr. 2018
• The picture of a masterly Putin calling every shot is apocryphal.
  — Holman W. Jenkins, WSJ, 13 Mar. 2018
• He was succeeded by Ronald Reagan, who did a masterly job of fusing might and right.
  — chicagotribune.com, 3 July 2017
• In the composer’s masterly songs, the solemn and the sensual collide.
  — Alex Ross, The New Yorker, 10 Aug. 2020
• His main weapon proved to be his masterly platform performances, which numbered about 200 a year.
  — Martin Pugh, Slate Magazine, 14 Apr. 2017
• Signori is a masterly oil painter who builds images in the classical manner with a succession of glazes.
  — Washington Post, 19 Nov. 2021
• The last redoubt was the masterly Structure 27.
  — Alex Ross, New Yorker, 24 Nov. 2025
• The result, though, is a masterly portrait of a titanic yet unfulfilled man.
  — The Economist, 22 Aug. 2019
• For the Times, Carl Zimmer has written his obit, in masterly fashion.
  — Jay Nordlinger, National Review, 29 Dec. 2021
• Although his sharp eye and accurate ear capture a place, its people and a time in a masterly way, his work goes far beyond regionalism.
  — Washington Post, 23 Apr. 2022
• And the filmmaker—a cold term for such a masterly artist—has portrayed every bit of it with perfect clarity and not the slightest whiff of preachment.
  — Joe Morgenstern, WSJ, 21 Nov. 2018
• His previous book was a masterly study of the American empires of Britain and Spain.
  — The Economist, 12 July 2018
• Sean Payton’s offense wouldn’t look nearly as masterly if its QB couldn’t make defenders move.
  — Andy Benoit, SI.com, 13 Mar. 2018
• Here, the simple running, jumping and stomping of Mario is taken to new heights with some masterly level and enemy design.
  — Paul Govan, WIRED, 18 Aug. 2008
• Hofstadter gives a masterly account of the early republic’s fierce debates about the virtues and flaws of partisanship.
  — Michael Kazin, WSJ, 4 Feb. 2022
• Broom does a masterly job of situating each of her family members as Katrina looms on the horizon.
  — Dwight Garner, New York Times, 5 Aug. 2019
• Jane Campion’s masterly psychodrama is a story of repression, something Rose knows a thing or two about.
  — Matthew Jacobs, Vulture, 2 Dec. 2021
• Here, those in the first few rows could see first-hand conductor Jordan de Souza’s masterly control of the mood and pacing in the crucial final passages.
  — Michael Phillips, chicagotribune.com, 14 Nov. 2021
• This is a masterly portrait that can be read as a critique of family life, the treatment of children and the psychic consequences of different forms of upbringing.
  — Rachel Cusk, The New Yorker, 21 Aug. 2019
• Filled with powerhouse turns, the sprawling drama reveals the 32-year-old writer-director to be a masterly filmmaker whose voice is one to be reckoned with.
  — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 28 May 2022
• In the meantime, there are ways to view Balanchine’s masterly two-act, six-scene ballet, to the music of Felix Mendelssohn, on the home screen, some just a click away.
  — Robert Greskovic, WSJ, 31 Mar. 2020
• In keeping with its title, the masterly final novel by Drndić, who died last year, suggests a brain scan of its narrator, a dying author and psychologist.
  — Sam Knight, The New Yorker, 12 Aug. 2019
• Gilligan’s trademark cold opens, which can transport us halfway around the world or introduce new characters, remain a masterly way of calibrating suspense.
  — Judy Berman, Time, 27 Oct. 2025
• Given that New Haven is the home of Yale, its museums hold not only masterly works of art, but erudite vestiges of history and science, as well.
  — Julie Besonen, New York Times, 25 May 2017
• We are most acquainted with her hunter, Ridgeway, who in the fourth episode is given a flashback treatment that is a masterly depiction of neurotic white masculinity.
  — Doreen St. Félix, The New Yorker, 14 May 2021