mawkishness

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.

All that signaling serves to diminish the impact of a not unanticipated “shock” denouement that strives for poignancy but ultimately flirts with mawkishness.

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 25, 2022

The Alcott verses, with their references to “Christmas fairies” and “chanting cherubs,” supply most of the mawkishness.

From Washington Post • Nov. 28, 2017

But where the execution of those storylines has garnered some criticism for moments of mawkishness or overwrought dialogue, it’s more successful in its honest depiction of cancer—or, at least, one specific cancer story.

From Time • Nov. 10, 2015

Heard at the second performance on Wednesday, the score leans on Ms. Higdon’s persistent weaknesses — namely, a tendency toward mawkishness — and stints her gifts for teasing out creative orchestral colors and instrumental combinations.

From New York Times • Aug. 6, 2015

With 'Uncle MARK' in the chair, I knew there would be neither austere autocracy, nor fain�ant laxity, neither weakness of stroke nor foulness of blow, neither Rosa-Matilda-ish, mawkishness, nor Rabelaisian coarseness.

From Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 101, Jubilee Issue, July 18, 1891 by Various