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Desolate vs Grim - What's the difference?

desolate | grim | Related terms |

As adjectives the difference between desolate and grim

is that desolate is deserted and devoid of inhabitants while grim is dismal and gloomy, cold and forbidding.

As a verb desolate

is to deprive of inhabitants.

As a proper noun Grim is

{{surname|A=An|English}}, probably derived from Old English grimm or Old Norse grimr or grimmr.

desolate

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Deserted and devoid of inhabitants.
  • a desolate''' isle; a '''desolate''' wilderness; a '''desolate house
  • * Bible, Jer. ix. 11
  • I will make Jerusalem a den of dragons, and I will make the cities of Judah desolate , without an inhabitant.
  • * Tennyson
  • And the silvery marish flowers that throng / The desolate creeks and pools among.
  • Barren and lifeless.
  • Made unfit for habitation or use; laid waste; neglected; destroyed.
  • desolate altars
  • Dismal or dreary.
  • Sad, forlorn and hopeless.
  • He was left desolate by the early death of his wife.
  • * Keble
  • voice of the poor and desolate

    Verb

    (desolat)
  • To deprive of inhabitants.
  • To devastate or lay waste somewhere.
  • To abandon or forsake something.
  • To make someone sad, forlorn and hopeless.
  • grim

    English

    Adjective

    (grimmer)
  • dismal and gloomy, cold and forbidding
  • Life was grim in many northern industrial towns.
  • rigid and unrelenting
  • His grim determination enabled him to win.
  • ghastly or sinister
  • A grim castle overshadowed the village.
  • * 2012 March 22, Scott Tobias, “ The Hunger Games''”, in ''AV Club :
  • In movie terms, it suggests Paul Verhoeven in Robocop/Starship Troopers mode, an R-rated bloodbath where the grim spectacle of children murdering each other on television is bread-and-circuses for the age of reality TV, enforced by a totalitarian regime to keep the masses at bay.
  • (UK, slang) disgusting; gross
  • Wanna see the dead rat I found in my fridge? —Mate, that is grim !