Adjective

(en adjective)

Causing pain or distress.

* 2006 , , Concrete: Killer Smile , Dark Horse Books, cover text

Harrowing journeys down the dark roads of anger, violence, and madness

*{{quote-magazine, date=2013-01

, author=Brian Hayes , title=Father of Fractals , volume=101, issue=1, page=62 , magazine= citation , passage=Toward the end of the war, Benoit was sent off on his own with forged papers; he wound up working as a horse groom at a chalet in the Loire valley. Mandelbrot describes this harrowing youth with great sangfroid.}}

Adjective

(en adjective)

Being filled with, or in a state of despair; hopeless.

* (William Shakespeare)

Since his exile she hath despised me most, / Forsworn my company and rail'd at me, / That I am desperate of obtaining her.

* , chapter=16

, title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“[…] She takes the whole thing with desperate seriousness. But the others are all easy and jovial—thinking about the good fare that is soon to be eaten, about the hired fly, about anything.”}}

Without regard to danger or safety; reckless; furious.

* Macaulay

desperate expedients

Beyond hope; causing despair; extremely perilous; irretrievable.

Extreme, in a bad sense; outrageous.

* (William Shakespeare)

a desperate offendress against nature

* Macaulay

the most desperate of reprobates

Extremely intense.