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STRAINING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
An intense or violent exertion
Synonyms:
strain; straining
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("straining" is a kind of...):
effort; elbow grease; exertion; sweat; travail (use of physical or mental energy; hard work)
Derivation:
strain (use to the utmost; exert vigorously or to full capacity)
Sense 2
Meaning:
The act of distorting something so it seems to mean something it was not intended to mean
Synonyms:
distortion; overrefinement; straining; torture; twisting
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("straining" is a kind of...):
falsification; misrepresentation (a willful perversion of facts)
II. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Taxing to the utmost; testing powers of endurance
Example:
your willingness after these six arduous days to remain here
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Similar:
effortful (requiring great physical effort)
III. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb strain
Context examples:
I saw Maud, my Maud, straining and struggling and crushed in the embrace of Wolf Larsen’s arms.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
There were cries of men, and churn of sleds, the creaking of harnesses, and the eager whimpering of straining dogs.
(White Fang, by Jack London)
He lifted his hand and opened his eyelids; gazed blank, and with a straining effort, on the sky, and toward the amphitheatre of trees: one saw that all to him was void darkness.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
In half an hour a good-sized gas-bag had been formed, and the jerking and straining upon the thongs showed that it was capable of considerable lift.
(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
A surface-active emollient, stool softener Docusate helps liquids to mix into dry stool, allowing patients to have a bowel movement without straining.
(Casanthranol/Docusate, NCI Thesaurus)
To see them straining away!
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
The array of pots rather amazed her at first, but John was so fond of jelly, and the nice little jars would look so well on the top shelf, that Meg resolved to fill them all, and spent a long day picking, boiling, straining, and fussing over her jelly.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
Also, he received the question with out-bursts of anger, raging and straining at the rawhide that bound him and threatening her with what he would do when he got loose, which he said he was sure to do sooner or later.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
Nothing followed for a time, but the remark had set us all on the alert, straining ears and eyes—the musketeers with their pieces balanced in their hands, the captain out in the middle of the block house with his mouth very tight and a frown on his face.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
He was straining every effort for the day when he could buy the adjoining lot and put up another two-story frame building.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
