PLAINTIVE: Synonyms and Related Words. What is Another Word for PLAINTIVE?

Need another word that means the same as “plaintive”? Find 19 synonyms and 30 related words for “plaintive” in this overview.

The synonyms of “Plaintive” are: mournful, sad, wistful, doleful, pathetic, pitiful, piteous, melancholy, melancholic, sorrowful, unhappy, wretched, woeful, grief-stricken, heartbroken, desolate, forlorn, woebegone, disconsolate

Plaintive as an Adjective

Definitions of "Plaintive" as an adjective

According to the Oxford Dictionary of English, “plaintive” as an adjective can have the following definitions:

• Sounding sad and mournful.
• Expressing sorrow.

Synonyms of "Plaintive" as an adjective (19 Words)

desolate	(of a place) uninhabited and giving an impression of bleak emptiness. I suddenly felt desolate and bereft.
disconsolate	Causing dejection. A disconsolate winter landscape.
doleful	Filled with or evoking sadness. He could be struck off with doleful consequences.
forlorn	(of an aim or endeavour) unlikely to succeed or be fulfilled. A forlorn attempt to escape.
grief-stricken	Sorrowful through loss or deprivation.
heartbroken	Full of sorrow. He was heartbroken at the thought of leaving the house.
melancholic	Characterized by or causing or expressing sadness. Patients with melancholic depression.
melancholy	Having a feeling of melancholy sad and pensive. She felt a little melancholy.
mournful	Expressing sorrow. Her large mournful eyes.
pathetic	Miserably inadequate; of very low standard. It was a pathetic sight.
piteous	Deserving or arousing pity. Piteous appeals for help.
pitiful	Deserving or inciting pity- Galsworthy. Pitiful exhibition of cowardice.
sad	Of things that make you feel sad Christina Rossetti. The show is tongue in cheek anyone who takes it seriously is a bit sad.
sorrowful	Experiencing or marked by or expressing sorrow especially that associated with irreparable loss- Proverbs 14:13. Sorrowful news.
unhappy	Unfortunate. Many were unhappy about the scale of the cuts.
wistful	Showing pensive sadness. The sensitive and wistful response of a poet to the gentler phases of beauty.
woebegone	Affected by or full of grief or woe- George du Maurier. His sorrow made him look haggard and woebegone.
woeful	Affected by or full of grief or woe. Her face was woeful.
wretched	Of poor quality; very bad. I felt so wretched because I thought I might never see you again.

Usage Examples of "Plaintive" as an adjective

• A plaintive cry.

Associations of "Plaintive" (30 Words)

cry	Bring into a particular state by crying. The cat was crying.
deplore	Express strong disapproval of. We deplore all violence.
dirge	A song or piece of music that is considered too slow, miserable, or boring. The wind howled dirges around the chimney.
disastrous	Causing great damage. A disastrous fire swept through the museum.
dithyramb	A wild choral hymn of ancient Greece, especially one dedicated to Dionysus.
doleful	Filled with or evoking sadness. A doleful look.
dolorous	Feeling or expressing great sorrow or distress. A dolorous and repetitive tale of atrocity.
elegiac	Verses in an elegiac metre. An elegiac lament for youthful ideals.
elegy	(in Greek and Latin verse) a poem written in elegiac couplets, as notably by Catullus and Propertius.
grieve	Cause great distress to (someone. It grieves me to think of you in that house alone.
grievous	Of great gravity or crucial import; requiring serious thought. A grievous loss.
heartsick	Full of sorrow. Weary and heartsick she forced herself to search throughout the remains of the village.
howl	Make a howling sound. I got howls of protest from readers.
lament	A mournful poem a lament for the dead. The women wept and lamented over him.
lamentable	(of circumstances or conditions) very bad; deplorable. A lamentable decision.
lamentation	A book of the Bible telling of the desolation of Judah after the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC. Scenes of lamentation.
mourn	Observe the customs of mourning after the death of a loved one. Publishers mourned declining sales of hardback fiction.
mournful	Expressing sorrow. Her large mournful eyes.
mourning	The passionate and demonstrative activity of expressing grief. If he dies she ll put on mourning but she won t cry.
sad	Of things that make you feel sad Christina Rossetti. They looked at her with sad anxious faces.
sadness	The state of being sad. A source of great sadness.
sob	An act or sound of sobbing. She sobbed out her troubles to him.
sorrow	An event or circumstance that causes sorrow. It was a great sorrow to her when they separated.
sorrowful	Experiencing or marked by or expressing sorrow especially that associated with irreparable loss. A sorrowful tale of death and despair.
sorry	In a poor or pitiful state. A sorry state of affairs.
threnody	A lament. A brooding threnody to urban desolation.
tragic	Very bad or inadequate. She wears tragic cardigans usually done up the wrong way.
wail	Utter a wail. Wail in self pity.
weep	A fit or period of weeping. Sit down and have a weep.
whimper	A whimpering sound. He s not dead is he she whimpered.