MOPE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does mope mean? 

• MOPE (noun)
  The noun MOPE has 1 sense:

1. someone who wastes time

  Familiarity information: MOPE used as a noun is very rare.

• MOPE (verb)
  The verb MOPE has 2 senses:

1. move around slowly and aimlessly

2. be apathetic, gloomy, or dazed

  Familiarity information: MOPE used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• MOPE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Someone who wastes time

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

dallier; dilly-dallier; dillydallier; lounger; mope

Hypernyms ("mope" is a kind of...):

bum; do-nothing; idler; layabout; loafer (person who does no work)

Derivation:

mope (be apathetic, gloomy, or dazed)

mope (move around slowly and aimlessly)

• MOPE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they mope    ... he / she / it mopes   
Past simple: moped   
Past participle: moped   
-ing form: moping   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Move around slowly and aimlessly

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Synonyms:

mope; mope around

Hypernyms (to "mope" is one way to...):

move (move so as to change position, perform a nontranslational motion)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

mope (someone who wastes time)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Be apathetic, gloomy, or dazed

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

moon about; moon around; mope

Hypernyms (to "mope" is one way to...):

be (have the quality of being; (copula, used with an adjective or a predicate noun))

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sentence example:

Sam and Sue mope over the results of the experiment

Derivation:

mope (someone who wastes time)

 Context examples 

“Why do you sit moping there, Annie?” cried her brother.

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

Won't that be better than moping here?

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

He moped after her departure from Holdernesse Hall, and it was for this reason that the Duke desired to send him to my establishment.

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

Why sit ye all moping by the fireside, like crows round a dead horse, when there is man's work to be done within a few short leagues of ye?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Mrs. Gummidge, no longer moping in her especial corner, was busy preparing breakfast.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

She's got most of the symptoms—is twittery and cross, doesn't eat, lies awake, and mopes in corners.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

“David,” said Mr. Murdstone, “to the young this is a world for action; not for moping and droning in.” —“As you do,” added his sister.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Why then should you, who are soldiers of the Spirit, be ever moping or hiding in cell or in cave, with minds full of your own concerns, while the world, which you should be mending, is going on its way, and neither sees nor hears you?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“He was the only friend I made during the two years I was at college. I was never a very sociable fellow, Watson, always rather fond of moping in my rooms and working out my own little methods of thought, so that I never mixed much with the men of my year. Bar fencing and boxing I had few athletic tastes, and then my line of study was quite distinct from that of the other fellows, so that we had no points of contact at all. Trevor was the only man I knew, and that only through the accident of his bull terrier freezing on to my ankle one morning as I went down to chapel.

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

I say, David, to the young this is a world for action, and not for moping and droning in.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)