- fitful
- fitful, spasmodic, convulsive are comparable when they mean lacking steadiness or regularity in course, movement, or succession (as of acts or efforts).Fitful stresses variability and intermittency; it implies an irregular succession characterized by fits and starts{
after life's fitful fever he sleeps well— Shak.
}{the fitful gloom and sudden lambencies of the room by firelight— De Quincey
}{a fitful[/i], undecided rain— Kipling
}{a. fitful wind swept the cheerless waste— Conrad
}{hitherto I've been gloomy, moody, fitful— Gilbert
}Spasmodic implies fitfulness, but it further suggests marked alternations (as of violent activity and inactivity or of great effort and of negligible effort or of zeal or enthusiasm and lack of interest); it therefore implies, even more than fitful, an opposition to what is sustained at a high pitch{spasmodic efforts to reform municipal government
}{spasmodic energy
}{a continuous discussion of international affairs, not spasmodic action at times of crisis— A ttlee
}{a spasmodic movement of despair— S. S. Van Dine
}{spasmodic industry
}Convulsive differs from the preceding terms in not implying intermittency and in stressing unsteadiness, strain or overstrain, and the lack of such regular rhythm as is the sign of control and especially of muscular, mental, or spiritual control{convulsive rise and fall of the breast
}{the convulsive movement of the earth characteristic of an earth- quake
}{he had a convulsive drive, a boundless and explosive fervor— Behrman
}{a convulsive little hug— Turnbull
}Analogous words: *intermittent, periodic, recurrent: desultory, hit-or- miss, *random, haphazardAntonyms: constant (sense 3)
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
