Ungainly
[ʌn'geɪnlɪ] or [ʌn'ɡenli]
Definition
(a.) Not gainly; not expert or dexterous; clumsy; awkward; uncouth; as, an ungainly strut in walking.
(a.) Unsuitable; unprofitable.
(adv.) In an ungainly manner.
Edited by Kathleen
Synonyms and Synonymous
a. Clumsy, awkward, uncouth, uncourtly, inelegant, clownish, boorish, gawky, loutish, lubberly, lumbering, slouching, ungraceful, stiff, constrained.
Editor: Verna
Synonyms and Antonyms
SYN:Clumsy, awkward, lumbering, uncouth,[See FRUITFUL]
Checker: Nellie
Definition
adj. awkward: clumsy: uncouth.—adv. in an awkward manner.—n. Ungain′liness.
Edited by Bryan
Examples
- I'm just something very ungainly that you've married. Ernest Hemingway. A Farewell To Arms.
- He lisped--he was very plain and homely-looking: and exceedingly awkward and ungainly. William Makepeace Thackeray. Vanity Fair.
- You know he is as ungainly within as without. Charles Dickens. Great Expectations.
- Of an ungainly make was Sloppy. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- One described it as an ungainly craft looking precisely like a backwoods sawmill mounted on a scow and set on fire. Rupert S. Holland. Historic Inventions.
- The ungainly piece of honesty beamed and blushed as he said it, quite enraptured with the remembrance of having been serviceable. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- He was clad only in his long night-dress, and his swollen ankles and ungainly feet protruded starkly from beneath it. Arthur Conan Doyle. The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
- He was so ungainly, so pimply about the head, so scaly about the legs, yet so serene, so unspeakably satisfied! Mark Twain. The Innocents Abroad.
- To reverence Washington they wear a powdered wig; they do honor to Lincoln by cultivating awkward hands and ungainly feet. Walter Lippmann. A Preface to Politics.
Checker: Thelma