as in lament
a composition expressing one's grief over a loss the composer's cello concerto was composed as a moving threnody for his late wife

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Example Sentences

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.
Recent Examples of threnody His diary shrank to a litany of suffering and a threnody for what might have been. Sara Wheeler, WSJ, 25 Oct. 2018 Most critics acknowledged the score’s beautiful moments, especially Cleopatra’s death scene, in which the character’s plaintive lyrical lines are capped by a chilling choral threnody. Anthony Tommasini, New York Times, 22 Dec. 2017 Needless to say, Murray’s threnody for Europe is as fundamentally incoherent as its late-19th-century originals. Pankaj Mishra, New York Times, 14 Sep. 2017 Threnody in X (FTF), Soda Pop (FTF), Corn Hives (FTF), Facts (FTF), Sophie Brown, WIRED, 9 Aug. 2011
Recent Examples of Synonyms for threnody
Noun
  • Deeply layered and emotionally charged, the work reads like a visual lament, for what’s been lost, what still remains, and the unresolved stories that continue to flow beneath the surface.
    Nel-Olivia Waga, Forbes.com, 17 Apr. 2025
  • Unfortunately, Curl laments they’re destined for the donation bin.
    Cori Sears, Better Homes & Gardens, 15 Apr. 2025
Noun
  • The title is borrowed from Elizabeth Alexander’s fourth collection persona poems, historical narratives, jazz riffs, sonnets, elegies, and a sequence of ars poetica which examines the Black experience through the lens of the slave rebellion on the Amistad and nineteenth-century American art.
    Natasha Gural, Forbes.com, 4 Apr. 2025
  • Eephus is an elegy, but with just the barest hint of sentimentality—a shrugging send-off that simultaneously cares deeply about America’s pastime.
    David Sims, The Atlantic, 14 Mar. 2025
Noun
  • Over time, dirge came to mean a funeral song or lament.
    Erik Kain, Forbes.com, 18 Apr. 2025
  • Returnal Returnal was one of the first exclusives of the PS5 generation; a fabulously grotesque sci-fi horror dirge, and still worth your attention today.
    Luke Winkie, Vulture, 1 Apr. 2025
Noun
  • The album thematically focuses on the idea of the afterlife in both a literal and figurative sense, with a touch of Carlile's anecdotal songwriting and requiems for artists' past.
    Madison E. Goldberg, People.com, 5 Apr. 2025
  • Whether a requiem is due for rom-coms or not, in the meantime there's at least a conveyor belt of cringe to feast upon.
    Anna Kaufman, USA TODAY, 6 Mar. 2025

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“Threnody.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/threnody. Accessed 1 May. 2025.

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