RANT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does rant mean? 

• RANT (noun)
  The noun RANT has 2 senses:

1. a loud bombastic declamation expressed with strong emotion

2. pompous or pretentious talk or writing

  Familiarity information: RANT used as a noun is rare.

• RANT (verb)
  The verb RANT has 1 sense:

1. talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner

  Familiarity information: RANT used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• RANT (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A loud bombastic declamation expressed with strong emotion

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

harangue; rant; ranting

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

declamation (vehement oratory)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "rant"):

screed (a long monotonous harangue)

Derivation:

rant (talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Pompous or pretentious talk or writing

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

blah; bombast; claptrap; fustian; rant

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

grandiloquence; grandiosity; magniloquence; ornateness; rhetoric (high-flown style; excessive use of verbal ornamentation)

Derivation:

rant (talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner)

• RANT (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they rant    ... he / she / it rants   
Past simple: ranted   
Past participle: ranted   
-ing form: ranting   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

jabber; mouth off; rabbit on; rant; rave; spout

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

mouth; speak; talk; utter; verbalise; verbalize (express in speech)

Sentence frames:

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

Sentence example:

Sam and Sue rant

Derivation:

rant (pompous or pretentious talk or writing)

rant (a loud bombastic declamation expressed with strong emotion)

ranter (someone who rants and raves; speaks in a violent or loud manner)

ranting (a loud bombastic declamation expressed with strong emotion)

 Context examples 

I shall offer to pay him to-morrow; he will rant and storm about his love for you, and there will be an end of the matter.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

If his rents were but equal to his rants!

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I joined them because Margery Alspaye, of Bolder, married Crooked Thomas of Ringwood, and left a certain John of Hordle in the cold, for that he was a ranting, roving blade who was not to be trusted in wedlock.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

I had no occasion of bribing, flattering, or pimping, to procure the favour of any great man, or of his minion; I wanted no fence against fraud or oppression: here was neither physician to destroy my body, nor lawyer to ruin my fortune; no informer to watch my words and actions, or forge accusations against me for hire: here were no gibers, censurers, backbiters, pickpockets, highwaymen, housebreakers, attorneys, bawds, buffoons, gamesters, politicians, wits, splenetics, tedious talkers, controvertists, ravishers, murderers, robbers, virtuosos; no leaders, or followers, of party and faction; no encouragers to vice, by seducement or examples; no dungeon, axes, gibbets, whipping-posts, or pillories; no cheating shopkeepers or mechanics; no pride, vanity, or affectation; no fops, bullies, drunkards, strolling whores, or poxes; no ranting, lewd, expensive wives; no stupid, proud pedants; no importunate, overbearing, quarrelsome, noisy, roaring, empty, conceited, swearing companions; no scoundrels raised from the dust upon the merit of their vices, or nobility thrown into it on account of their virtues; no lords, fiddlers, judges, or dancing-masters.

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

Let us have no ranting tragedies.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

A poor honourable is no catch, and I cannot imagine any liking in the case, for take away his rants, and the poor baron has nothing.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

I feel as if I could be anything or everything; as if I could rant and storm, or sigh or cut capers, in any tragedy or comedy in the English language.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

Mr. Yates was particularly pleased: he had been sighing and longing to do the Baron at Ecclesford, had grudged every rant of Lord Ravenshaw's, and been forced to re-rant it all in his own room.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

He stepped to the door, rejoicing at that moment in having the means of immediate communication, and, opening it, found himself on the stage of a theatre, and opposed to a ranting young man, who appeared likely to knock him down backwards.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

She knew that Mr. Yates was in general thought to rant dreadfully; that Mr. Yates was disappointed in Henry Crawford; that Tom Bertram spoke so quick he would be unintelligible; that Mrs. Grant spoiled everything by laughing; that Edmund was behindhand with his part, and that it was misery to have anything to do with Mr. Rushworth, who was wanting a prompter through every speech.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)