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STRIFE
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Bitter conflict; heated often violent dissension
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("strife" is a kind of...):
battle; conflict; struggle (an open clash between two opposing groups (or individuals))
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "strife"):
countercurrent; crosscurrent (actions counter to the main group activity)
discord; discordance (strife resulting from a lack of agreement)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Lack of agreement or harmony
Synonyms:
discord; strife
Classified under:
Nouns denoting stable states of affairs
Hypernyms ("strife" is a kind of...):
disorder (a disturbance of the peace or of public order)
Context examples:
Veer the sheet! and strange it was to him to see how swiftly the blood-stained sailors turned from the strife to the ropes and back.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
It was in such a storm, and the worst that we had experienced, that I cast a weary glance to leeward, not in quest of anything, but more from the weariness of facing the elemental strife, and in mute appeal, almost, to the wrathful powers to cease and let us be.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
I was not happy; but, thus far, I had faithfully set the seal upon the Past, and, thinking of her, pointing upward, thought of her as pointing to that sky above me, where, in the mystery to come, I might yet love her with a love unknown on earth, and tell her what the strife had been within me when I loved her here.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
He it is who stirs up strife, and forever blows the dying embers into flame.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
He was a beautiful creature, almost feminine in the pleasing lines of his figure, and there was a softness and dreaminess in his large eyes which seemed to contradict his well-earned reputation for strife and action.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
The rest of the half-year is a jumble in my recollection of the daily strife and struggle of our lives; of the waning summer and the changing season; of the frosty mornings when we were rung out of bed, and the cold, cold smell of the dark nights when we were rung into bed again; of the evening schoolroom dimly lighted and indifferently warmed, and the morning schoolroom which was nothing but a great shivering-machine; of the alternation of boiled beef with roast beef, and boiled mutton with roast mutton; of clods of bread-and-butter, dog's-eared lesson-books, cracked slates, tear-blotted copy-books, canings, rulerings, hair-cuttings, rainy Sundays, suet-puddings, and a dirty atmosphere of ink, surrounding all.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Besides, when ye talk of taking me to France, ye do not conceive how useless I should be to you, seeing that neither by training nor by nature am I fitted for the wars, and there seems to be nought but strife in those parts.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
