desolate

“Tapeheads” captures a specific moment in Los Angeles history, sure to be nostalgic for some, from a desolate downtown to a percolating music scene.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2026

A failed plan to bring in casinos left the area desolate after other businesses closed to make way for development that never emerged.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 5, 2026

As we climbed the winding road to Bédar, we emerged into a charred and desolate landscape.

From BBC ● Jul. 13, 2026

The delicate pitter-patter of a drum’s cymbal is the only sound to break through the thick brick wall of the obscure performance venue, Sun Space, and reach the wide, desolate Sunland Boulevard.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 18, 2026

But the Boss had no idea what he would find when he returned to the desolate spot where he had left his men.

From "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World" by Jennifer Armstrong

The sudden death of Leontes' young son desolates him.

From Time Magazine Archive

But your misrepresentation which pained me most, in fact desolates me to the extent that I am unfit for work, is your statement that I weigh 200 Ib.

From Time Magazine Archive

He visits Barbara's soup kitchen shelter and proves with an open checkbook that he can bribe the poor and buy the Army, which desolates Barbara.

From Time Magazine Archive

That the putrefied weeds have poisoned the air, and the poisoned air causes the yellow fever, that desolates these beautiful countries.

From Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea by Jules Verne

He desolates the whole Mohammedan kingdom—and still he is not sated.

From Folk-Tales of Napoleon The Napoleon of the People; Napoleonder by George Kennan

Hospital director Dr Muhammad Abu Salima has called on the WHO and the UN to help the medical teams and patients "leave this desolated place".

From BBC ● Nov. 19, 2023

She walked alone through its desolated main street, Khreschatyk.

From New York Times ● Nov. 4, 2022

At the same time, Wallerstein could offer a mild reassurance: "It would certainly not be great, but it is not necessarily the desolated moonscape that people sometimes imagine it would be."

From Salon ● Oct. 7, 2022

Even in the depths of the pandemic — even when the world locked down, leaving billions isolated and desolated — there were those who danced.

From Seattle Times ● Oct. 16, 2021

But there were not many black people visible on this day and Paradise had the look of a town desolated by plague or the rumor of plague.

From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy

When D’Amore isn’t speaking — and for most of those three minutes and 40 seconds, she is silent — her body language is desolating.

From Salon ● Sep. 1, 2019

“The simple way...to put an end to the savage and desolating war now waged by the slaveholders, is to strike down slavery itself, the primal cause of that war.”

From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018

It sounds as if your mother is relatively young herself, so this is a diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s which is even more desolating.

From Slate ● Jul. 20, 2015

It goes beyond documentary, drawing on a visionary stage vocabulary and creating individual stories that are both desolating and stirring.

From The Guardian ● Jan. 27, 2013

But the flowers, the smell, the movement of the leaves persist, rich, mesmerizing, desolating, infused with grief.

From "Cat's Eye" by Margaret Atwood