leitmotif

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

The Argentine author, whose writing habitually draws on the uncanny, here delivers a blend of superstition, dread and a leitmotif of mental instability in a register of acute psychological realism.

From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 9, 2025

Through these depictions, the show tries to tell the histories of the nomadic, tribal and agrarian communities for whom resilient survival was the leitmotif and cloth a way of narrating their marginalised experiences.

From BBC • Mar. 29, 2025

It was a leitmotif in everything that was being said for decades,” Traube said, adding that he is upset both by the resurgence of antisemitism and the lack of a “massive popular reaction” against it.

From Seattle Times • Nov. 9, 2023

A leitmotif in "Strange New Worlds" relates to Pike foreknowledge that a life-changing accident lurks in his future.

From Salon • Aug. 18, 2023

The goal of a leitmotif is to help the listener identify the main characters and give each a very short musical pattern, so that every time their name is mentioned, someone plays that pattern.

From "Music and the Child" by Natalie Sarrazin