agonize
verbEtymology
From French agoniser, from Late Latin agonizare, from Ancient Greek ἀγωνίζομαι (agōnízomai, “to fight, contend”). See agony. By surface analysis, agon + -ize.
Definitions
To writhe with agony
To writhe with agony; to suffer violent anguish.
- His Touch, if tremblingly alive all o’er, / To smart, and agonize at ev’ry pore?
To struggle
To struggle; to wrestle; to strive desperately, whether mentally or physically.
- So I took a last stare round, agonizing to see if there was any way of escape; but the stone walls and roof were solid enough to crush me, and the stack of casks too closely packed to hide more than a rat.
To cause agony or anguish in someone.
- That dreadful bill […] was one of the chief torments of her life. At all hours of the night or day it was waiting just round the corner of her consciousness, ready to spring upon her and agonise her […]
›+ 1 more definitionshow fewer
To act as an agonist upon
To act as an agonist upon; to combine with a receptor on a cell to produce a physiological reaction.
The neighborhood
- synonymagonize
- synonymlament
- synonymbereave
- synonymfret
- synonymtorture
- antonymchill
- antonymrelax
- antonymtake it easy
- neighboragon
- neighboragony
- neighboragonization
- neighbordeagonize
- neighboragonizing
- neighborangst
- neighborworry
Derived
Vish — recursive loop
A definitional loop anchored at agonize. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.
A definitional loop anchored at agonize. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.
5 hops · closes at agonize
curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA