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RENDING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Resembling a sound of violent tearing as of something ripped apart or lightning splitting a tree
Example:
heard a rending roar as the crowd surged forward
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Similar:
cacophonic; cacophonous (having an unpleasant sound)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb rend
Context examples:
And amid all this bursting, rending, throbbing of awakening life, under the blazing sun and through the soft-sighing breezes, like wayfarers to death, staggered the two men, the woman, and the huskies.
(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)
With a rending, tearing sound, one of the broad, white stones turned over upon its side and left a square, gaping hole, through which streamed the light of a lantern.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Yes, Mrs. Reed, to you I owe some fearful pangs of mental suffering, but I ought to forgive you, for you knew not what you did: while rending my heart-strings, you thought you were only uprooting my bad propensities.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
On a Saturday night, which was my grand treat,—partly because it was a great thing to walk home with six or seven shillings in my pocket, looking into the shops and thinking what such a sum would buy, and partly because I went home early,—Mrs. Micawber would make the most heart-rending confidences to me; also on a Sunday morning, when I mixed the portion of tea or coffee I had bought over-night, in a little shaving-pot, and sat late at my breakfast.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
"If I could go out of life now, without too sharp a pang, it would be well for me," I thought; then I should not have to make the effort of cracking my heart-strings in rending them from among Mr. Rochester's.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
I was so shocked by the contents of this heart-rending letter, that I ran off directly towards the little hotel with the intention of taking it on my way to Doctor Strong's, and trying to soothe Mr. Micawber with a word of comfort.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Undulating hills were changed to valleys, undulating valleys (with a solitary storm-bird sometimes skimming through them) were lifted up to hills; masses of water shivered and shook the beach with a booming sound; every shape tumultuously rolled on, as soon as made, to change its shape and place, and beat another shape and place away; the ideal shore on the horizon, with its towers and buildings, rose and fell; the clouds fell fast and thick; I seemed to see a rending and upheaving of all nature.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
