brooding

adjective

brood·​ing ˈbrü-diŋ How to pronounce brooding (audio)
1
: moodily or sullenly thoughtful or serious
a brooding genius
a brooding, embittered man
2
: darkly somber
a brooding landscape
a quiet, brooding atmosphere
brooding, violent images reminiscent of … film noir …Tracy Hopkins
broodingly adverb
a broodingly handsome actor
Gardner gazes broodingly at the camera … Kathleen Murphy

Examples of brooding in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
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.
There's what's timelessly now and what's fearlessly next — Dean's most brooding, heaviest and loudest songs represent the latter. Marcus K. Dowling, The Tennessean, 27 Dec. 2024 Label executives were excited about a star who had an online following, an instantly iconic vocal signature, an appealingly brooding persona and, in her songwriting, an unusually keen sense of pop’s jumbled history. Steven Zeitchik, The Hollywood Reporter, 5 Dec. 2024 Jenna Ortega, who plays the titular role, launched the Netflix series into phenomenon-level popularity when its brooding first season premiered in 2022. Larisha Paul, Rolling Stone, 4 Dec. 2024 The day of, NYU’s unofficial campus was flooded with more brooding brown-haired twinks than finals week as the Timothées descended on the park to hundreds of onlookers and dozens of journalists. Michael Savio, Vulture, 15 Nov. 2024 See all Example Sentences for brooding 

Word History

First Known Use

1818, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of brooding was in 1818

Dictionary Entries Near brooding

Cite this Entry

“Brooding.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/brooding. Accessed 2 Jan. 2025.

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
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