wistful
Meanings
Adjective Satellite
- showing pensive sadness
- "the sensitive and wistful response of a poet to the gentler phases of beauty"
Adj
- Full of longing or yearning.
- Sad and thoughtful.
Origin / Etymology
Presumably from *whistful, from whist (“silent”) + -ful, based on older wistly. It is implausible that it derives from wishful, the required sound change being wishful → *wisful → wistful, which could not occur in Modern English, particularly not with wishful continuing in use. However, the sense of “longing” appears to be influenced by wishful, making wistful an ambiguous poetic word.
Synonyms
atrabiliary, atrabilious, blitheless, blue, bummed out, chapfallen, cheerless, chopfallen, crestfallen, cut up, damp, dejected, depressed, desirous, despondent, disconsolate, disgruntled, disheartened, dismal, doleful, dolesome, down, down in the dumps, down in the mouth, downcast, downhearted, downsome, dull, elegiac, elegious, forlorn, gloomy, glum, grief-stricken, grieving, heartsick, heartsore, heavy-hearted, inconsolable, infelicitous, jawfallen, joyless, lachrymose, lamentful, low, low-spirited, lugubrious, lumpish, melancholic, melancholy, miserable, moody, mopey, morose, mournful, passionate, pensive, plaintive, querulous, sad, saddened, saturnine, shattered, solemn, sombre, sorrow-ridden, sorrowful, sorrowsome, spiritless, sullen, threnetic, threnetical, triste, tristful, uncheerful, uncheery, unconsolable, unhappy, unlively, wistful, woe, woebegone, woeful, wretched, yearnful
Scrabble Score: 13
wistful is a valid Scrabble (US) TWL wordwistful is a valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
wistful is a valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary