travail

The author of the novel “Good Company” on tales of travail from Edith Wharton, Elena Ferrante and others.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 10, 2026

Mulaney's second personal travail – which he does not address at all – was his highly publicized divorce from Anna-Marie Tendler and subsequent relationship with Olivia Munn with whom he had a child.

From Salon ● May 3, 2023

Hurston was a “keen strategist of racial deference,” and her views on America’s racial travail clashed with those of another project writer and seminal Black author, Richard Wright.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 8, 2021

They, and all beings, as the naturalist Henry Beston wrote, are “caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.”

From New York Times ● May 2, 2020

And all this time, in travail, sobbing, gaining on the current, we rowed into the strait—Skylla to port and on our starboard beam Kharybdis, dire gorge of the salt sea tide.

From "The Odyssey" by Homer

That and oil price buoyancy pushed the peso up 10% against the dollar this year despite budgetary travails.

From Barron's ● Jun. 22, 2026

A bevy of trial lawyers and other states are already trying to cash in on social media companies, arguing they are responsible for the travails of young people.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 3, 2026

Over the last month while in hospice, Frank did a number of interviews with US media, commenting on his life's work, the current political mood and the travails of the left.

From BBC ● May 20, 2026

You can be scared into saving by reading the travails of a person who has realized that they’ve been left behind with Social Security and little else.

From MarketWatch ● May 13, 2026

It was an early evening in May, and the cotillion experience was long behind her, but Lily was sharing, with her new friend, the travails of her past life.

From "It All Comes Down to This" by Karen English

English translations of the Bible often use it in this context, such as in Isaiah 66:7: “Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a man child.”

From Washington Post ● Oct. 10, 2020

It be like knowing you are what praying women had in mind when they travailed for tomorrow.

From "Watch Us Rise" by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan

Nine days, according to Homer, Leto travailed with Apollo: but he was Apollo, lord of Song.

From On The Art of Reading by Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

She waved not a hand, fluttered no kerchief of farewell, only stood sadly watching the sons with whom she had travailed, like one who watches the dear dead borne to their last resting-place.

From The Black Douglas by Frank Richards

The priest having read the text as chance might lead him, read the vespers for Sunday;—and you must know he travailed hard, that the offerings should be worth something to him.

From Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers by William Alexander Clouston

The vision of the one eternal, passionless Spirit, far removed from the world of chance and change and earthly soilure, was the conquest of Greek philosophy, travailing for 800 years.

From Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius by Samuel Dill

After "travailing all winter long," sleeping on snow without shelter, and suffering other hardships, they reached Europe in June, 1247, where they were "rejoiced over as men that had been risen from death to life."

From Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) The Romance of Reality by Charles Morris

And for great grief of her soul's travailing He gave consent she should endure in peace Till her life's end; yea, till her time should cease, She should abide in fellowship of pain.

From Poems & Ballads (First Series) by Algernon Charles Swinburne

Like physical birth, spiritual regeneration is preceded by travailing, i.e. fear and painful contrition.

From Grace, Actual and Habitual A Dogmatic Treatise by Arthur Preuss

So in the most melancholy strains of his music one who heeds well may detect the presence of a lofty ideal that uplifts and strengthens the travailing soul.

From For Every Music Lover A Series of Practical Essays on Music by Aubertine Woodward Moore