How to Use undertow in a Sentence

undertow

noun

• Don't get caught in the undertow.
• This result was that a wave crashed down on me, the undertow pulling me and the board down.
  — Seth Combs, San Diego Union-Tribune, 18 Sep. 2022
• There is an undertow of black and blue fruit—a wine clafoutis.
  — Tom Mullen, Forbes, 28 Feb. 2021
• This is truest in Point Breeze, where the undertow of class and race are added into the mix.
  — Tom Ferrick, Philly.com, 17 Oct. 2017
• But winds of 30 mph and a strong undertow sucked them away from shore.
  — Tom Jackman, Washington Post, 8 Apr. 2020
• There’s this weird undertow of fear and nobody knows what this fear is now.
  — Chris Payne, Billboard, 15 Nov. 2017
• There were so many spirals in the current of the river, and many undertows.
  — Krista Stevens, Longreads, 22 May 2018
• An undertow of sadness tugs at the margins of this book.
  — Adam Begley, WSJ, 25 Aug. 2017
• This was the milieu in which Sui began her life as an adult, dazzling and askew, all the brighter for its dark undertow.
  — Susan Dominus Photographs By Joshua Kissi Styled By Ian Bradley Sasha Weiss Photographs By Collier Schorr Styled By Jay Massacret Megan O’Grady Portrait By Mickalene Thomas and Racquel Chevremont Ligaya Mishan Photographs By Tina Barney, New York Times, 14 Oct. 2021
• But that way, in these songwriters’ hands, lies glibness and the undertow of camp.
  — Michael Phillips, chicagotribune.com, 1 Oct. 2021
• The ship sank in 90 minutes, its undertow dragging many with it.
  — Washington Post, 8 June 2021
• There is even a lake on the grounds, but that is where the Sinclairs’ older son drowned himself, the first clue to the story’s tragic undertow.
  — Caryn James, The Hollywood Reporter, 13 June 2023
• Yet there was an unnamed undertow, something coiled at the bottom of the dark lake of Knausgaard's soul.
  — John Timpane, Philly.com, 4 June 2018
• That danger comes through from the start of the opera: Over a deep, sustained pedal tone, the music heaves and surges with murky harmonies and a brassy undertow.
  — New York Times, 1 June 2018
• Full of humor and pathos, and with a quiet, melancholy undertow.
  — Riza Cruz, ELLE, 23 Feb. 2022
• In both Afire and Showing Up, this snarling undertow is played to perfection.
  — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 6 Dec. 2023
• And there’s always the undertow — that chance of ending up in deeper waters.
  — Kory Grow, Rolling Stone, 15 Feb. 2022
• The writing is taut, with a percussive, rhythmic undertow that pulls you right in.
  — Riza Cruz, ELLE, 23 Feb. 2022
• But Shults' scenes of house parties and electric-blue beach dusks are tinged with an undertow of dread, danger and melancholy.
  — Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter, 31 Aug. 2019
• While rescuing a man who had gone over the dam, they were caught in the undertow created by water rushing over the dam.
  — Sarah Freishtat, Aurora Beacon-News, 28 July 2017
• But there are indications of an undertow and factors that might increase it in the years ahead.
  — Rich Lowry, National Review, 22 Oct. 2021
• And the Maels are among the great wits of rock for how, as silly as the songs can get, there’s usually (not always) a real emotional undertow to the work.
  — Chris Willman, Variety, 8 Feb. 2022
• The hero of that tale—which will, of course, inevitably intertwine with the others—is Franklin, a smart kid nonetheless pulled in by drugs’ undertow.
  — vanityfair.com, 5 July 2017
• The surf slams, invisible a few feet away in the profound blackness, the undertow sucking back, the stormy breeze dizzying.
  — Nina Burleigh, Smithsonian Magazine, 4 Jan. 2024
• But all the while the weight of their son’s unresolved murder and the byzantine Pakistani court system was a constant undertow in their lives.
  — Christi Carras, Los Angeles Times, 4 Aug. 2021
• The fourth wave of feminism had arrived with a big splash, pulling Weinstein and his ilk into the undertow.
  — New York Times, 10 July 2022
• But no matter how many drug users start on the path to healing, others remain caught in the undertow of addiction.
  — Beth Warren, The Courier-Journal, 27 Apr. 2017
• Dimitri was ready to finally let the drugs carry him away, like an undertow.
  — Jonathan Reiss, Rolling Stone, 10 May 2021
• An undertow pulls under the surface, while a rip current flows out, not under.
  — Jennifer Borresen, USA TODAY, 24 June 2024
• Yet the authoritarian undertow of the past decade or so has been weaker than those that followed the previous waves.
  — Sheri Berman, Foreign Affairs, 1 Nov. 2022

Last Updated: 16 Nov 2024