heartrending
3
7.8
- adjective
- /ˈhɑrtˌrɛndɪŋ/
- The story on your Tumblr about your baby goats being born, and unfortunately losing one (read here), is both heartwarming and heartrending.
- a heartrending story
- a heartrending scene
- the most heartrending
Examples
-
In a heartrending scene, the father hugged his daughter tightly as they said goodbye at the airport.
-
"It was heartrending, that look in Bennie's eyes."
Fiction book (1994) -
What makes the case especially heartrending is that the birth mother has said she would take Emily back just to keep her from her biological father.
Academic text (1994) -
Many school counselors have witnessed a heartrending scene at the start of the school year, in which distressed young children are facing new and challenging situations and tasks.
Academic text (2007) -
Its subject was the most heartrending sight of 9/11, the multitude of victims driven by the flames to leap from the World Trade Center towers, their private agony played out on the world's most public stage.
Academic text (2009) -
The movie was heartrending, leaving many in the audience in tears by the final credits.
-
Her heartrending story about losing her pet moved everyone in the room to tears.
Synonyms
92
3.7
Causing someone to feel very sad and upset
51
7.5
Causing very strong emotional or physical pain
25
7.9
Causing great pain or sorrow
17
7.4
That makes you feel very sad and upset
13
3.5
To make someone feel very sad and often cry
Antonyms
How Moving
Surface Forms
Morphology
Etymology
Heartrending comes from heart and rend, where rend means 'to tear', so it paints the picture of your heart being torn. That's why something heartrending causes deep sorrow.