gloat
part of speech
verb (gloat, gloats, gloated, gloating); noun (a gloat — rare)
meaning for a pupil
To gloat means to show you are very pleased about your own success or about someone else's bad luck, in a smug and unkind way. tree →
sense in the lessons
In the Tanakh and Jewish tradition: To look at someone's misfortune with cruel pleasure. In Psalm 22 enemies stare at the suffering speaker. Interpretation: The tradition reads Psalm 22 as the cry of one in deep trouble, often linked to Esther and Israel in exile. The enemies who stare are shown as cruel. In the primary lessons: In everyday life and sport, gloating is seen as bad manners: being a good winner means not gloating. In stories, a villain who gloats tells the reader they are cruel and proud. Phrases: gloat over, gloat about, no gloating.
examples
- I may count all my bones; they look and gloat over me. (Writings PSA.22.18, JPS 1917) tree →
- Do not gloat when you win a game; shake hands instead. tree →
- My brother gloated about beating me at chess all week. tree →
- The villain gloated over the trapped hero. tree →
- She tried not to gloat when her prediction came true. tree →
- It is unkind to gloat when someone gets told off. tree →
- «No gloating!» said the teacher after the quiz. tree →
- The fans gloated after their team won the derby. tree →
- At last this greedy and selfish old woman put down the box by the wayside and opened it carefully, expecting to gloat her eyes on a mine of wealth. tree →
note
Usually followed by «over» or «about». Gloating is always negative; being happy and proud of a win is fine, gloating is rubbing it in.
In the corpora
- I may count all my bones; they look and gloat over me.
- And Ruby, beaten by a gloating boy, simply said «good game».
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «gloat» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.