DOLEFULLY

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does dolefully mean? 

• DOLEFULLY (adverb)
  The adverb DOLEFULLY has 1 sense:

1. with sadness; in a sorrowful manner

  Familiarity information: DOLEFULLY used as an adverb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DOLEFULLY (adverb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

With sadness; in a sorrowful manner

Synonyms:

dolefully; sorrowfully

Context example:

his mother looked at him dolefully when he told her he had joined the Army

Pertainym:

doleful (filled with or evoking sadness)

 Context examples 

“Ah!” said the man, dolefully, “my wife wants to live in a stone castle.”

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

"I keep turning over new leaves, and spoiling them, as I used to spoil my copybooks, and I make so many beginnings there never will be an end," he said dolefully.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

And I thought it was a ditty rather too dolefully appropriate for a company that had met such cruel losses in the morning.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

"Why don't you eat?" he demanded, as Martin dipped dolefully into the cold, half-cooked oatmeal mush.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

The coach jolts, I wake with a start, and the flute has come back again, and the Master at Salem House is sitting with his legs crossed, playing it dolefully, while the old woman of the house looks on delighted.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)