YEARN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does yearn mean? 

• YEARN (verb)
  The verb YEARN has 3 senses:

1. desire strongly or persistently

2. have a desire for something or someone who is not present

3. have affection for; feel tenderness for

  Familiarity information: YEARN used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• YEARN (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they yearn    ... he / she / it yearns   
Past simple: yearned   
Past participle: yearned   
-ing form: yearning   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Desire strongly or persistently

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

hanker; long; yearn

Hypernyms (to "yearn" is one way to...):

desire; want (feel or have a desire for; want strongly)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "yearn"):

ache; languish; pine; yearn; yen (have a desire for something or someone who is not present)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Sentence example:

They yearn to move

Derivation:

yearner (a person with a strong desire for something)

yearning (prolonged unfulfilled desire or need)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Have a desire for something or someone who is not present

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Synonyms:

ache; languish; pine; yearn; yen

Context example:

I am pining for my lover

Hypernyms (to "yearn" is one way to...):

hanker; long; yearn (desire strongly or persistently)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "yearn"):

die (languish as with love or desire)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Derivation:

yearner (a person with a strong desire for something)

yearning (prolonged unfulfilled desire or need)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Have affection for; feel tenderness for

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Hypernyms (to "yearn" is one way to...):

care for; cherish; hold dear; treasure (be fond of; be attached to)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

 Context examples 

There was over me a yearning for sleep, in some sort of blind belief that to wake would be to find things changed, and that any change must now be for the better.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

He looked, and was aware of a great yearning, akin in sensation to physical hunger.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

His gaze wandered often toward her lips, and he yearned for them hungrily.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

His strength left him, and the last his mates saw of him he lay gasping in the snow and yearning toward them.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

Saturn will have you yearning to make a home decision that will give you comfort and stability, and Mars will make you anxious and eager to get started.

(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)

Before long the cat was seized by another fit of yearning.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Mrs. Crupp was to find linen, and to cook; every other necessary was already provided; and Mrs. Crupp expressly intimated that she should always yearn towards me as a son.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

“It is clumsy, but it will serve the purpose, and that is the main thing,” I went on, yearning for her praise.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

For he knew that there, floating in the blue above him, was meat, the meat his stomach yearned after so insistently.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

Come back! she did not stretch out her yearning arms in vain.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)