DEPLORABLE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does deplorable mean? 

• DEPLORABLE (adjective)
  The adjective DEPLORABLE has 3 senses:

1. bad; unfortunate

2. of very poor quality or condition

3. bringing or deserving severe rebuke or censure

  Familiarity information: DEPLORABLE used as an adjective is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DEPLORABLE (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Bad; unfortunate

Synonyms:

deplorable; distressing; lamentable; pitiful; sad; sorry

Context example:

a sorry state of affairs

Similar:

bad (having undesirable or negative qualities)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Of very poor quality or condition

Synonyms:

deplorable; execrable; miserable; woeful; wretched

Context example:

woeful errors of judgment

Similar:

inferior (of low or inferior quality)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Bringing or deserving severe rebuke or censure

Synonyms:

condemnable; criminal; deplorable; reprehensible; vicious

Context example:

adultery is as reprehensible for a husband as for a wife

Similar:

wrong (contrary to conscience or morality or law)

 Context examples 

His forgetfulness about the key would have mattered little upon any other occasion, but on this one day it has produced the most deplorable consequences.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

He was a tearful boy, and broke into such deplorable lamentations, when a cessation of our connexion was hinted at, that we were obliged to keep him.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I could not marry her, for I have a wife who has left me for years and yet whom, by the deplorable laws of England, I could not divorce.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I cannot conceive a situation more deplorable.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

The interests of his deplorable profession are immaterial to us; but, as he observes, we cannot get down in any case, so it is a waste of energy to discuss it.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“Good God!” cried Emma, “this has been a most unfortunate—most deplorable mistake! What is to be done?”

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

The case seemed wholly desperate and deplorable; and this magnificent palace would have infallibly been burnt down to the ground, if, by a presence of mind unusual to me, I had not suddenly thought of an expedient.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

He had suffered, and he had learned to think: two advantages that he had never known before; and the self-reproach arising from the deplorable event in Wimpole Street, to which he felt himself accessory by all the dangerous intimacy of his unjustifiable theatre, made an impression on his mind which, at the age of six-and-twenty, with no want of sense or good companions, was durable in its happy effects.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

If he had not loved Jo very much, I don't think he could have done it then, for she looked far from lovely, with her skirts in a deplorable state, her rubber boots splashed to the ankle, and her bonnet a ruin.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Now, I am aware that there was a most deplorable occurrence in our house last night.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)