cudgel

A growing number of self-described creatives wield legal protections, legitimate and non, as a cudgel against others.

From Salon ● Jul. 7, 2026

Another was to give investors such as government pension funds a cudgel to pressure companies into reducing CO2 emissions.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 29, 2026

The administration again turned to trade as a tool to achieve various aims and as a cudgel.

From Barron's ● Mar. 4, 2026

But some experts say such fees cannot be used as a cudgel to punish players that break a contract and transfer.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 24, 2025

When they had called many times, at last the Gate-keeper came out, and they saw that he carried a great cudgel.

From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien

This scene emphasizes the film’s “savor every moment” theme that “We Live in Time” relentlessly cudgels viewers with for 108 endless minutes.

From Salon ● Oct. 11, 2024

Their stand-up turns jokes into cudgels to break down racism, homophobia and systemic discrimination, but they also tend to be more comfortable than many comics in delaying punch lines in service of an argument.

From New York Times ● Jun. 26, 2018

These days, when a proposal leads people to lay down their partisan cudgels and cooperate, it must be an exceptionally good idea.

From Washington Post ● Feb. 6, 2018

Carragher takes up the cudgels: “We try to have a theme in every show,” he explains.

From The Guardian ● Aug. 23, 2014

The grounds came to life with teeming swarms of Guerrilla Shrews armed to the teeth with rapiers, cudgels and slings.

From "Redwall" by Brian Jacques

The action may not be as important as the message — that people deserved to be treated with respect and dignity — but that message is cudgeled into viewers.

From Salon ● Dec. 23, 2020

It is only with some remove that this array gives up its scatter graph specificity and can be cudgeled into a best fit line.

From Slate ● May 4, 2016

Exposition abounds, events that should be summarized drag out in tiresome scenes, what should be insinuated is instead cudgeled home.

From Slate ● Nov. 8, 2013

Holbrooke, having more or less imprisoned the delegations on the U.S. airbase at Dayton, Ohio, cudgeled them into grudging submission.

From Newsweek ● Dec. 14, 2010

I cudgeled my brains as I never did before, but to no avail.

From In the Claws of the German Eagle by Albert Rhys Williams

Dollars & Scents In Manhattan prominent artists cudgelled their imaginations for the perfect perfume bottle.

From Time Magazine Archive

Even the despised and cudgelled ass had a share in his protection.

From Spanish Highways and Byways by Katharine Lee Bates

She cudgelled her brains to devise some means of getting the better of her captives.

From The Mystery of the Green Ray by William Le Queux

He fought with Tim Tearcoat, and cudgelled with Ben, And wrestled with Sampson—all quarrelsome men;— I was sorry to see him thus wasting his force On fellows who kicked with the heels of a horse.

From The Poems of Philip Freneau, Volume I (of III) by Philip Freneau

Since the gun episode, resulting so signally in the biter being bit, and bit hard, Sonnenberg had cudgelled his crafty and scheming brain to hit upon a plan, but hitherto in vain.

From A Veldt Official A Novel of Circumstance by Bertram Mitford

With the return of the buyer's market, every U.S. manufacturer is cudgeling his brain?and the brains of designers?to make his product work better, feel better, look better and sell better than those of his rivals.

From Time Magazine Archive

Mr. Lippmann is mistaken when he uses the map as a means of cudgeling our academic system of education.

From Time Magazine Archive

On the other hand, their release of 214 Americans for combat would invite a propaganda cudgeling from China, ever eager to berate Moscow for betraying its allies in Hanoi.

From Time Magazine Archive

That was followed by Black Snow, a cudgeling of Stanislavsky.

From Time Magazine Archive

And during the whole of the dance he was cudgeling his brains as to the meaning of pretty Michal's words.

From Pretty Michal by Mór Jókai

Stevens portrays Dickens at his desk, cudgelling his brains to find the name of the miser for his forthcoming tale.

From The Guardian ● Dec. 2, 2017

The contemporary guardians of culture have a habit of cudgelling anyone who might try to use culture for didactic ends or to open a subject up to a mass audience.

From BBC ● Jan. 7, 2011

Secretary Mellon wrote a "cudgelling," Are the "good times" so good?

From Time Magazine Archive

Pradelle had been cudgelling his brains for the past ten minutes, but the more he tried to find something à propos the more every pleasant subject seemed to recede.

From The Haute Noblesse A Novel by George Manville Fenn

When I refused everything, he sat down heavily on the sofa, frowning, and angrily cudgelling his wits for something to say—in vain.

From The White Peacock by D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence