OPPRESSIVE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Oppressive

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/əprˈɛsɪv/ Listen

adjective

Oppressive adj.

Unreasonably burdensome; unjustly severe, rigorous, or harsh; as, oppressive taxes; oppressive exactions of service; an oppressive game law.

Using oppression; tyrannical; as, oppressive authority or commands.

Heavy; overpowering; hard to be borne; creating a sense of heavy burden; as, oppressive grief or woe; oppressive heat or humidity; an oppressive workload. "To ease the soul of one oppressive weight."

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Etymology of 'Oppressive'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Oppressive" Quotes from Famous Books

... the band preceded the allocution by the governor. He also spoke sotto voce, as if to himself, and as no one heard his words, the fans of native straw and Chinese turkey feathers were plied incessantly. The heat was oppressive. A sigh of relief came with the entr'acte, when all the grown folk flocked to the attached saloon. I joined the queen's group for a few moments, and drank champagne with her and her daughters, and I was called over to have a glass of Perrier ...

— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien

... turned pale. In the next room there was the sound of bitter, genuine weeping, as though of someone insulted. And he realized that there were real people living here who, like people everywhere else, felt insulted, suffered, wept, and cried for help. The feeling of oppressive hate and disgust gave way to an acute feeling of pity and anger against the aggressor. He rushed into the room where there was weeping. Across rows of bottles on a marble-top table he distinguished a suffering face, wet ...

— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... same oppressive darkness and silence once more, a heavy breathing by the still warm fireplace, suggesting that Shanter, well refreshed with damper, had gone to sleep, and the boys instinctively shrank from disturbing ...

— The Dingo Boys - The Squatters of Wallaby Range • G. Manville Fenn

... was half a mile wide. When the rocks were not precipitous the sides were clothed with a luxuriant foliage, among which the birds maintained a concert of call and song. So sheltered were they that, high as it was above the sea, the heat was very oppressive; and when they reached the head of the valley, late in the afternoon, they were glad indeed of a bathe in ...

— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty

... oppressive: even the nights are hot, until about 2 A.M., at which hour a cool breeze springs up. The wind now blows from the south until about 1 P.M., when it changes suddenly to the north, and then varies between these two points during the rest ...

— The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia • Samuel W. Baker

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