Desperate ˈdespərət I Save Adjective Prisoners Grew Increasingly

• the prisoners grew increasingly desperate.
• stores are getting desperate after two years of poor sales.
• somewhere out there was a desperate man, cold, hungry, hunted.
• i heard sounds of a desperate struggle in the next room.

desperate

1. feeling or showing that you have little hope and are ready to do anything without worrying about danger to yourself or others
• The prisoners grew increasingly desperate.
• Stores are getting desperate after two years of poor sales.
• Somewhere out there was a desperate man, cold, hungry, hunted.
• I heard sounds of a desperate struggle in the next room.

Extra Examples

• I was starting to get desperate.
• She felt utterly desperate.
• The sudden loss of his money had made him desperate.
2. giving little hope of success; tried when everything else has failed
• He made a desperate bid for freedom.
• She clung to the edge in a desperate attempt to save herself.
• His increasing financial difficulties forced him to take desperate measures.
• Doctors were fighting a desperate battle to save the little girl's life.

Extra Examples

• a desperate search for a way out
• Jake held up his hands in a desperate plea for calm.
• Kaleil's final, desperate efforts to save the business come to naught.
3. needing or wanting something very much
• He was so desperate for a job he would have done anything.
• I'm desperate for a cigarette.
• to be desperate for money/help/cash/attention
• I was absolutely desperate to see her.
• She was desperate to escape small town life.
4. extremely serious or dangerous
• The children are in desperate need of love and attention.
• They face a desperate shortage of clean water.
• His financial situation was desperate.
• He had died in desperate poverty.
• American farmers are in desperate straits today.

Word Origin

• late Middle English (in the sense ‘in despair’): from Latin desperatus ‘deprived of hope’, past participle of desperare, from de- ‘down from’ + sperare ‘to hope’.