dismalize

present singular third person dismalizes · participle present dismalizing · participle past dismalized · past dismalized · alternative dismalise

1. To make dismal.

   The greater are those human tensions which dismalize and disintegrate, the more important creative recreation becomes.

   1942, Journal of Physical Education and Recreation - Volume 13, page 492

   3 more examples

   And glancing through the pages of the “Lowell Offering” a year or two later, I see that I continued to dismalize myself at times, quite unnecessarily.

   1889, Lucy Larcom, A New England Girlhood: Outlined from Memory, page 213

   I remember he said to her, 'Why do young people like to dismalize themselves? Later in life we have no need to do that.'

   1893, Margaret Sidney, Whittier with the Children, page 29

   In the words of Dr. Irwin Edman in an article on "No Blackout for the Arts," appearing in a recent issue of RECREATION, we may "dismalize" and "demoralize" life in our pathetic eagerness to make first things first, if we do not recognize the "consolations and refreshment of the arts," and their "curative and energizing values."

   1956, International Recreation Congress, Philadelphia, Proceedings - Volume 27, page 157