as in desolate
producing inferior or only a small amount of vegetation
it was hard to eke out even a bare existence on the hardscrabble lands
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Recent Examples of hardscrabble
On the one hand, as Tevye is fond of saying, the story unfolds in a hardscrabble shtetl in the Ukrainian plains in the months leading up to the Russian Empire’s abortive 1905 revolution.
—
David Lyman, The Enquirer, 25 July 2025
Born in 1805 to a hardscrabble Vermont family and raised amid the fervor of the Second Great Awakening, Joseph Smith claimed at age 14 to have seen God the Father and Jesus Christ in a grove of trees.
—Mary Katharine Ham, National Review, 24 July 2025
Her hardscrabble upbringing in Kentucky, immortalized in her autobiography and its film version (starring Sissy Spacek as Lynn in an Oscar-winning role), seemed to drive her unapologetic approach to music.
—Lindsay Kusiak, Smithsonian Magazine, 19 May 2025
Shahn was known as a social realist: a painter of hardscrabble life who registered every spasm and twitch of the body politic, from the Great Depression to Vietnam.
—Zachary Fine, New Yorker, 24 June 2025
See All Example Sentences for hardscrabble
David Lyman, The Enquirer, 25 July 2025
Born in 1805 to a hardscrabble Vermont family and raised amid the fervor of the Second Great Awakening, Joseph Smith claimed at age 14 to have seen God the Father and Jesus Christ in a grove of trees.
—Mary Katharine Ham, National Review, 24 July 2025
Her hardscrabble upbringing in Kentucky, immortalized in her autobiography and its film version (starring Sissy Spacek as Lynn in an Oscar-winning role), seemed to drive her unapologetic approach to music.
—Lindsay Kusiak, Smithsonian Magazine, 19 May 2025
Shahn was known as a social realist: a painter of hardscrabble life who registered every spasm and twitch of the body politic, from the Great Depression to Vietnam.
—Zachary Fine, New Yorker, 24 June 2025
See All Example Sentences for hardscrabble
Recent Examples of Synonyms for hardscrabble
Adjective
-
The Emperor Titus attempted but failed to revive Pompeii and its sibling town Herculaneum soon after the catastrophe, leaving the desolate region largely abandoned until its rediscovery in 1748.—
Andrew Paul Aug 7,
Popular Science,
7 Aug. 2025
-
In Namibia, Shipwreck Lodge in the desolate Skeleton Coast National Park and the secluded Hoanib Valley Camp are oases of luxury in otherworldly settings.—
Erina Pinar,
Travel + Leisure,
7 Aug. 2025
Adjective
-
Miss Lonelyhearts—who is actually a man—is an advice columnist receiving letters from people who are impoverished, in despair, and surrounded by an atmosphere of moral depravity and incipient fascism.—
The New Yorker,
New Yorker,
16 July 2025
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Some of the city's most impoverished communities also wrestle with the highest rates of afflictions like heart disease, and research suggests more tree canopy and green spaces can reduce these risks, in addition to benefiting stress levels and general quality of life.—
Connor Giffin,
The Courier-Journal,
3 July 2025
Adjective
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What might more readily bring about a crisis of identity than the physical alteration of the body, the change from bearer of life to barren woman?—
Hillary Kelly,
The Atlantic,
5 Aug. 2025
-
Most of those barren years came before a current regime that has taken English cricket to new highs of attacking intent.—
Tim Ellis,
Forbes.com,
4 Aug. 2025
Adjective
-
Directed by Paul Schrader with a script by Bret Easton Ellis, this spiritually bleak L.A. drama features Lohan’s most daring performance, and probably the only one that manages to break completely with her childhood and adolescent roles.—
Tom Gliatto,
People.com,
9 Aug. 2025
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The situation is bleak enough that, even if aid increases rapidly in the coming weeks, deaths from starvation are almost certain to rise.—
Isaac Chotiner,
New Yorker,
5 Aug. 2025
Adjective
-
However, the quality of the product is sometimes, notably, poorer.—
Julia Gomez,
USA Today,
4 Aug. 2025
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In the dining room of The Brother Benno Center, a refuge for the area’s poor and homeless, more than 100 people gathered recently to celebrate the 90th birthday of the Rev. Charles Wright, who has been a spiritual guide there for four decades.—
Linda Mcintosh,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
4 Aug. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Hardscrabble.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/hardscrabble. Accessed 15 Aug. 2025.
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