Elegant
['elɪg(ə)nt] or ['ɛləgənt]
Definition
(adj.) refined and tasteful in appearance or behavior or style; 'elegant handwriting'; 'an elegant dark suit'; 'she was elegant to her fingertips'; 'small churches with elegant white spires'; 'an elegant mathematical solution--simple and precise and lucid' .
(adj.) displaying effortless beauty and simplicity in movement or execution; 'an elegant dancer'; 'an elegant mathematical solution -- simple and precise' .
(adj.) suggesting taste, ease, and wealth .
Edited by Ellis--From WordNet
Definition
(a.) Very choice, and hence, pleasing to good taste; characterized by grace, propriety, and refinement, and the absence of every thing offensive; exciting admiration and approbation by symmetry, completeness, freedom from blemish, and the like; graceful; tasteful and highly attractive; as, elegant manners; elegant style of composition; an elegant speaker; an elegant structure.
(a.) Exercising a nice choice; discriminating beauty or sensitive to beauty; as, elegant taste.
Edited by Eileen
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. [1]. Graceful, beautiful, handsome, fine, symmetrical, classical, tasty, tasteful, chaste, neat, well-made, well-proportioned, in good taste.[2]. Polished, refined, accomplished, cultivated, polite, genteel, courtly, fashionable.
Editor: Rodney
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Graceful, lovely, well_formed, well_made, symmetrical, accomplished, polished,refined, handsome
ANT:Inelegant, deformed, unsymmetrical, ill-proportioned, ungraceful, coarse, rude
Editor: Lora
Definition
adj. pleasing to good taste: graceful: neat: refined: nice: richly ornamental.—ns. El′egance El′egancy the state or quality of being elegant: the beauty of propriety: refinement: that which is elegant; Elegante (el-e-gangt′) a lady of fashion.—adv. El′egantly.
Typist: Osborn
Examples
- Jane Fairfax was very elegant, remarkably elegant; and she had herself the highest value for elegance. Jane Austen. Emma.
- Then, her understanding was beyond every suspicion, quick and clear; and her manners were the mirror of her own modest and elegant mind. Jane Austen. Mansfield Park.
- Her figure was elegant, and she walked well; but Darcy, at whom it was all aimed, was still inflexibly studious. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.
- I like your nice manners and refined ways of speaking, when you don't try to be elegant. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- They said they were elegant and very moderate in price. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- Therefore, to use the expressive, if not elegant, language of a schoolgirl, He was as nervous as a witch and as cross as a bear. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- The police would scare him to death first with a storm of their elegant blasphemy, and then pull him to pieces getting him away from there. Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- I had seen her last in elegant evening attire. Charlotte Bronte. Villette.
- Mr. Crawford was a most pleasant, gentleman-like man; his sister a sweet, pretty, elegant, lively girl. Jane Austen. Mansfield Park.
- The next evening found us all quite _rayonnante_, waiting for our dinner in Mr. Dick's elegant drawing-room. Harriette Wilson. The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson.
- Mrs. Rogers whispered Mrs. Raddle that he was really an elegant young man. Charles Dickens. The Pickwick Papers.
- A man in distressed circumstances has not time for all those elegant decorums which other people may observe. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.
- Her figure is elegant and has the effect of being tall. Charles Dickens. Bleak House.
- Her body was long and elegant, her face was crushed tiny like a beetle's, she had rows of round heavy collars, like a column of quoits, on her neck. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- Here Bella, deriving no comfort from her charming bonnet and her elegant dress, burst into tears. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- Nor was her respect for him, though it made her more quiet, at all likely to make her more elegant. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.
- I never in my life saw anything more elegant than their dresses. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.
- But sometimes of an evening, before we went to cards, he would read something aloud out of the Elegant Extracts, very entertaining. Jane Austen. Emma.
- Very nicely dressed, indeed; a remarkably elegant gown. Jane Austen. Emma.
- We copied it from the Elegant Extracts. Jane Austen. Emma.
- Mrs. Shaw and her maid found plenty of occupation in restoring Margaret's wardrobe to a state of elegant variety. Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell. North and South.
- The whole to conclude with a chaste and elegant GENERAL SLAUGHTER! Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- And his long, pale, rather elegant face flickered as he made his sarcastic remarks. D. H. Lawrence. Women in Love .
- How elegant he looks! William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- On our arrival at Livius's lodgings in Dover Street, we found an elegant, cold supper laid out, with plenty of champagne on the side-board. Harriette Wilson. The Memoirs of Harriette Wilson.
- But you have brought the elegant turn-out, my love? Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- I roused myself, and looked about me in the room where I was left alone: this was furnished like the first, only after a more elegant manner. Jonathan Swift. Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World.
- This ingenious article itself, without the elegant domino-box, card-basket, .c. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- You can dress for both, and be as elegant as you please. Louisa May Alcott. Little Women.
- It looked like a caf?but was more elegant. Hemingway, Ernest. For Whom The Bell Tolls.
Typist: Osborn