How to Use desolation in a Sentence

desolation

noun
  • She sank into a state of desolation and despair.
  • Where is the message that can pull them out of the depths of desolation?
    — Laura Washington, Chicago Tribune, 12 Mar. 2025
  • Each tries to coax a few sprigs of joy and drops of purpose out of her desolation.
    — Vulture, 23 Nov. 2022
  • All loss is akin to other loss; loss begets loss, and loss leads to desolation.
    — Cynthia Ozick, New York Times, 14 May 2018
  • But stare at the image long enough, and the desolation fades.
    — Danyel Smith, New York Times, 8 Feb. 2023
  • But the family that runs the place is at home in the desolation.
    — Ashlea Halpern, WIRED, 24 May 2017
  • Tundra brings to mind desolation, but this region is in fact packed with life.
    — Matt Simon, Wired, 4 Jan. 2022
  • So the desolation wilderness looks kind of bonkers.
    — Outside Online, 18 Mar. 2026
  • Only death and desolation in the end.
    — Harvey Levine, San Diego Union-Tribune, 18 Mar. 2026
  • Every street presents a tableaux of desolation.
    — Nabih Bulos, Los Angeles Times, 22 June 2026
  • The desolation left by fame’s fickleness struck a deep chord.
    — Los Angeles Times, 10 Oct. 2021
  • Eyes on eyes, the warm embrace that can soothe and comfort us in moments of both joy and desolation.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 7 May 2021
  • In the high desert east of this border town, the rolling hills topped with mesquite and paloverde trees are a picture of rugged desolation.
    — Richard Marosi, latimes.com, 16 Apr. 2018
  • The swirling, giant storm, with its menacing eye, spoke of desolation to come.
    — Chantel Acevedo, Vogue, 13 Oct. 2017
  • Feral hogs are relieving us from the desolation of the world!
    — Marissa R. Moss, Los Angeles Times, 7 Aug. 2019
  • But conditions on the ground have become a litany of desolation.
    — Robin George Andrews, The Atlantic, 18 Oct. 2021
  • Also, a mood of desolation emanates even from those who are not condemned to exile.
    — Anthony Lane, The New Yorker, 18 Aug. 2023
  • That desolation is brief, and fleeting.
    — Linnie Greene, Pitchfork, 17 Feb. 2026
  • All that desolation might get old if Sub Zero didn’t get so much mileage out of its somber remit.
    — Andrew Ryce, Pitchfork, 27 Feb. 2026
  • Cabimas’s desolation marks a swift downfall for a town that just a decade ago was one of the richest in Venezuela.
    — Isayen Herrera, New York Times, 7 Oct. 2020
  • Ryan Reynolds went from joy to despair, and punch-the-air ecstasy to desolation.
    — Steve Douglas, Fortune, 30 Jan. 2023
  • The first turn of the bowtie comes at the city’s southern edge, where there’s more sand and more browns and more desolation, like a high that’s wearing off.
    — Nicholas Triolo, Outside Online, 21 Mar. 2023
  • There’s the wilderness itself—the desolation of the ridges and the quiet under the cathedral pines.
    — Dave Hurteau, Field & Stream, 18 Dec. 2020
  • Despite the sense of desolation, life still abounds around the Titanic.
    — Marisa Sloan, Discover Magazine, 4 Feb. 2022
  • The track builds to a hard-rocking stomp and, later, a punky gallop, but throughout, the sense of desolation remains.
    — Hank Shteamer, SPIN, 24 Apr. 2023
  • There’s no way to translate that kind of desolation, just as there’s no way to fully enter someone’s skin-crawling dreams.
    — Eric Boodman, STAT, 30 Dec. 2020
  • Advertisement For the rest, the scene as the Carpathia came up was one of desolation.
    — Times Staff, Los Angeles Times, 22 June 2023
  • Ochoa’s snide speech about his privileged private school becomes a wrenching aria of desolation and need.
    — Steven Winn, San Francisco Chronicle, 3 Apr. 2026
  • Noir is a cry of desolation in the face of a universe that is malevolent—or, at best, indifferent.
    — David L. Ulin, The New Republic, 11 Feb. 2020
  • The thrill—and the challenge—of this corner of Botswana’s Sua Pan is its desolation.
    — The Editors, Outside Online, 18 June 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'desolation.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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