mirthless

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 mirthless Historically, autocrats are a mirthless bunch. David Remnick, New Yorker, 19 Sep. 2025 Splashes of elegance in gravestone carving appear as the mirthless old Puritans die, people get richer, and London goes royal. Brian T. Allen, National Review, 19 July 2025 Why is this one mirthless and artless? Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune, 29 Jan. 2025 Yet there was a mirthless response from those around him; a realisation there was an element of truth to his chant. Roshane Thomas, The Athletic, 30 Dec. 2024 His mirthless laugh might have suggested Kafkaesque persecution, or Hardyesque inexorability of fate. Tad Friend, The New Yorker, 21 Oct. 2024 Susan Faludi Laugh-In On the joyful Kamala Harris and the mirthless Donald Trump Nathaniel Rich Silent Spring Why aren’t the candidates talking about climate change? Patricia J. Williams, The New York Review of Books, 18 Oct. 2024
Recent Examples of Synonyms for mirthless
Adjective
  • With two more wins against the woebegone Chicago White Sox, Seattle could sneak to within 1 1/2 games before the Astros open a weekend series at Yankee Stadium on Friday.
    Chandler Rome, New York Times, 7 Aug. 2025
  • Only Hunter Goodman, a catcher who played for Hartford in 2022 and 23, will represent the woebegone franchise in the All-Star Game.
    Dom Amore, Hartford Courant, 13 July 2025
Adjective
  • For three days, things were cheerless for Courtney Williams.
    Mike Cook, Twin Cities, 28 May 2025
  • Gomez gestured across the street toward 100 Centre Street—the criminal courthouse, a cheerless Art Deco building the color of cinder blocks.
    Sarah Lustbader, The New Yorker, 10 Mar. 2025
Adjective
  • As Morgan and Sasha chat it up at Noah’s family’s Purim party, a sad-eyed Esther stands off to the side, quietly watching the interaction.
    Kate Erbland, IndieWire, 24 Oct. 2025
  • The footage shows Deiseroth’s demeanor teetering between sad and angry.
    David Goodhue October 24, Miami Herald, 24 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • On occasion, especially as the film builds to its lugubrious finale, Mielants tries other tricks, simulating long tracking shots that seem to glide through the school and then out onto the grounds.
    Richard Lawson, IndieWire, 5 Sep. 2025
  • The legacy relaunch — originally titled Superman: Legacy when the project was announced in 2023 — represents a stark departure from writer-director Zack Snyder’s comparatively lugubrious, Zod-killing superhero deconstruction Man of Steel (2013).
    Chris Lee, Vulture, 14 July 2025
Adjective
  • Neither bubbly like Annie nor morose like Interiors’ Renata, Mary was a funny, sad, ambitious New Yorker whose intellect and beauty had gotten her exactly nowhere.
    Tim Grierson, Rolling Stone, 11 Oct. 2025
  • Appropriate to the popular conception of the morose genius, Poe’s initial 1849 funeral, held amidst the October gloom, was sparsely attended.
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 8 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • The melancholic pop-rock of the title track showcases the group’s strong vocals and has already earned some long-overdue domestic success.
    Nicole Fell, HollywoodReporter, 17 Oct. 2025
  • Tsypkin’s account of dramatic summer of gambling and deathbed prayers is accompanied by his own melancholic photographs of nondescript walls and windows, taken on a research trip to Leningrad.
    Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 16 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • The melancholy truth is that things have sunk into a morass of demoralization and low standards, with journalism inhabiting the poverty sector among the disciplines, and this at a time when communications nationally and internationally have reached an apex of urgency and complexity.
    David Wingrave, Harpers Magazine, 24 Oct. 2025
  • The soundscape’s melancholy unease conveys a sense of people persisting against the chaos of the world.
    Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 23 Oct. 2025
Adjective
  • Team members in the McLaren garage celebrated the team's championship victory with much enthusiasm, while Piastri was seen attending media duties, looking dejected.
    Saajan Jogia, MSNBC Newsweek, 6 Oct. 2025
  • Maeve ends up turning Sam into the police, exhausted, dejected, and utterly defeated.
    Grace Byron, Vulture, 6 Oct. 2025

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Cite this Entry

“Mirthless.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/mirthless. Accessed 27 Oct. 2025.

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