Word.ws English Dictionary

worldweary

worldweary is the alternative form of world-weary.

Meaning of world-weary

Adjective

world-weary (comparative world-wearier, superlative world-weariest)

  1. Tired of the ways of the world; feeling apathetic or cynical due to one's life experiences.
    • O here
      Will I ſet vp my euerlaſting reſt:
      And ſhake the yoke of inauſpicious ſtarres
      From this world-wearied fleſh: […][c. 1591–1595 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Romeo and Ivliet”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
    Synonyms:
    jaded, world-wearied
  2. Bored with life.
    • In the cafés of the Boule Miche, where the decadent movements are hatched and the fledgling Verlaines come to drown their sorrows in vermouth, you may see the lacklustre visages and tumbled hair of "diabolical" poets and the world-weary figures of end-of-the-century youngsters pledging their...1894, I[srael] Zangwill, “Paris”, in Without Prejudice, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1896, →OCLC, part II (Here, There, and Somewhere Else: Philosophic Excursions), pages 309–310

Forms of worldweary

comparativeworldwearier
comparativemore worldweary
superlativeworldweariest
superlativemost worldweary

Questions about worldweary

What is worldweary the alternative form of?
Worldweary is the alternative form of world-weary.

Words near worldweary in the dictionary

  1. worldward
  2. worldwards
  3. worldwearier
  4. worldweariest
  5. worldweariness
  6. worldweary
  7. worldwide
  8. worldwidely
  9. worldwideness
  10. worldwisdom
  11. worldwise

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: worldweary (page history and authors); world-weary (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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