as in lament
a composition expressing one's grief over a loss "O Captain! My Captain!" is Walt Whitman's elegy on the death of President Lincoln

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of elegy He’s made biopics (Malcolm X) and 9/11 elegies (25th Hour). Tim Grierson, Vulture, 16 Aug. 2025 Much of the chapter is like an elegy to what would be lost. Shaun McKinnon, AZCentral.com, 5 Aug. 2025 Bulgakov’s novel The White Guard, published in 1925 and set at the same time, is an elegy for Tsarist Kyiv that detests both Ukrainian national aspirations and Bolshevik rule. Uilleam Blacker, The Atlantic, 4 June 2025 What if Durham’s vision for the sequel could be turned inside out, undergoing a transformation like The Greatest from retrospective to comeback, elegy to unfinished story. Melina Moe may 19, Literary Hub, 19 May 2025 See All Example Sentences for elegy
Recent Examples of Synonyms for elegy
Noun
  • Told through empathetic interviews with his bandmates and family, Struebing’s ordeal becomes a tale of partial redemption and a lament about the failure of our justice system to meet the mental-health needs of people caught up in it.
    Judy Berman, Time, 29 Sep. 2025
  • The same lament was played during Queen Elizabeth's funeral in 2022.
    Stephanie Petit, PEOPLE, 16 Sep. 2025
Noun
  • Further down the lineup, Friday has Bieber collaborator and indie fave Dijon alongside the melodic dirges of Ethel Cain.
    Jason P. Frank, Vulture, 16 Sep. 2025
  • The Season 3 finale of the sci-fi series delivers on that promise, unfolding with the solemn rhythm of a funeral dirge.
    JP Mangalindan, Time, 12 Sep. 2025
Noun
  • The Duke of York retreated from public life in November 2019 after a car crash interview with the BBC about his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, but attended the requiem mass at Westminster Cathedral on Tuesday afternoon.
    Jack Royston, MSNBC Newsweek, 16 Sep. 2025
  • Like many of the 27 tracks on her Grammy-winning album of the year, her Cowboy Carter and Rodeo Chitlin’ Circuit Tour is a requiem to Black artists who have helped shape country music and a reclamation of Americana for those who have been shut out.
    Megan Thomas, CNN Money, 27 June 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Elegy.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/elegy. Accessed 2 Oct. 2025.

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