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ASTONISHMENT
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
The feeling that accompanies something extremely surprising
Example:
he looked at me in astonishment
Synonyms:
amazement; astonishment
Classified under:
Nouns denoting feelings and emotions
Hypernyms ("astonishment" is a kind of...):
feeling (the experiencing of affective and emotional states)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "astonishment"):
admiration; wonder; wonderment (the feeling aroused by something strange and surprising)
surprise (the astonishment you feel when something totally unexpected happens to you)
stupefaction (a feeling of stupefied astonishment)
Derivation:
astonish (affect with wonder)
Context examples:
To his astonishment, they had disappeared.
(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)
How Hannah came in to exclaim, "Sakes alive, well I never!" in great astonishment at 'that Jo's doin's'.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
He listened very gravely; his face, as I went on, expressed more concern than astonishment; he did not immediately speak when I had concluded.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Everything had happened at once—the blow, the counter-blow, the squeal of agony from the porcupine, the big cat's squall of sudden hurt and astonishment.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
With astonishment did Elizabeth see that her new acquaintance was at least as much embarrassed as herself.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
Alleyne looked at her in astonishment, for her cheek was flushed, her eyes gleaming, and her whole pose full of eloquence and conviction.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
My uncle stopped him with a cry of astonishment.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Elinor looked at him with greater astonishment than ever.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
“Me!” she replied with a smile of astonishment, “are you imagining me to be Mr. Elton's object?”
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
The astonishment which I had at first experienced on this discovery soon gave place to delight and rapture.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
