parvenu

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.

Chenoweth, who is as gleaming as a holiday ornament on Liberace’s Christmas tree, arrives at a canny balance of quixotic generosity and parvenu carelessness in her portrayal of a woman she refuses to lampoon.

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 9, 2025

But Corya is no vulgar, narcissistic bully and parvenu.

From Slate • May 21, 2020

Just as the parvenu tries to elevate himself into a higher social realm, the word climber wishes to seem more intelligent than he actually is.

From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 13, 2017

He comes across as a shrewd, well-meaning parvenu who savors the expensive, tacky trappings of his success but who has no mythic stature whatsoever.

From New York Times • Jul. 4, 2013

The three heroines belong to an old family, which is devoted to old ways, old furniture, and has an aversion to anything which savors of modernity and the parvenu.

From The Riverside Bulletin, March, 1910 Houghton Mifflin Books for Spring and Summer by Anonymous