dire

Từ điển LongMan Dictionary

dire/daɪə $ daɪr/ adjective
[date : 1500-1600; Language : Latin; Origin : dirus]
1. extremely serious or terrible:
　 ▪ warnings of dire consequences that often don’t come true
　 ▪ The country is in dire need of food aid.
　 ▪ The situation looked dire.

2. be in dire straits
to be in an extremely difficult or serious situation:
　 ▪ Everyone agrees the sport is in dire straits.

3. dire warning/prediction/forecast
a warning about something terrible that will happen in the future:
　 ▪ Last night there were dire warnings of civil war.

adjective
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a desperate/dire shortage (=very serious and worrying)
▪ There is a desperate shortage of fresh water in the disaster area.
a dire/gloomy prediction (=saying that something bad will happen)
▪ There have been some gloomy predictions about the economy recently.
abject/grinding/dire poverty (=extremely severe)
▪ He was shocked by the abject poverty that he saw.
disastrous/dire consequences (=very bad and damaging)
▪ If temperatures continue to rise, it could have disastrous consequences for agriculture.
in dire financial straits
▪ The firm is now in dire financial straits.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
ADVERB
as
▪ Our only solace is that it was just as dire on all the other formats.
▪ The situation Clinton faces in 1996 is not nearly as dire as that which confronted Carter in 1979.
▪ The game consisted entirely of cavalry charges end to end. As dire a Leeds win as I have seen.
▪ But state, local and federal officials in Los Angeles said the situation was not as dire.
more
▪ We didn't make Abisko, chickening out as the weather worsened and the forecasts began to sound even more dire.
▪ The other challenge was perhaps more dire.
▪ Carried up to the Governor's House, in much physical pain, his mental pain proved to be more dire.
▪ In Florida, the situation is more dire.
▪ Screen acting doesn't get much more dire than this.
▪ Things grew more dire for Death Row in the fall.
▪ And somehow, in a setting that had once been rural, it seemed yet more dire.
so
▪ But they were not so dire as to scare investors into dumping government bonds.
▪ He said it could follow an incident so dire that the mind had to block it out, sometimes along with other things.
▪ There's no situation so dire that people who love each other can't see it through.
NOUN
consequence
▪ As a result, at least some of the Bill's dire consequences were mitigated.
▪ Both suggest, either by statement or implication, that Buchanan is an extremist and warn of dire consequences to his nomination.
▪ The conditions may sound wonderful, but they can have dire consequences.
▪ Most came to realize that leading such an imbalanced life led to dire consequences.
▪ John Gibson highlights the regressive aspects of recent local government financial reform, and predicts dire consequences for the urban poor.
▪ He also warned of dire consequences such as hyper-inflation if the country failed to maintain a unified budget and a co-ordinated fiscal policy.
▪ The sweep into Putumayo promises equally dire consequences.
▪ Publicly the banks have suggested that there could be dire consequences for the City should the deals be ruled illegal.
forecast
▪ Good shape despite the dire forecasts still being made by much of the business world?
▪ The most dire forecasts say rising mercury on Earth could bring about both devastating floods and droughts.
▪ That was the rift that grabbed headlines late in 1990, as a result of a dire forecast.
▪ Take the current fascination with dire forecasts, for example.
need
▪ Feeling in dire need of fresh air, Ellie went outside into the grounds.
▪ She had helped me in my direst need.
▪ But many of them are in dire need of repair.
▪ There is a dire need to encourage juniors into academic obstetrics and gynaecology.
▪ But the passing over of Neil Back leaves the Lions without a commodity of which they could find themselves in dire need.
poverty
▪ Grandmothers, on whose distressed faces the direst poverty was written, raised their arms in greeting.
▪ The overwhelming impression left by the survey is one of dire poverty.
▪ The youngsters are living in dire poverty in their home country.
prediction
▪ The crisis has unsettled financial markets and brought dire predictions of revolution or civil war from some politicians.
▪ He was walking in spite of all those specialists and their dire predictions.
▪ When a highly qualified professional makes such a dire prediction, one has to sit up and take notice.
▪ He derived, so far as I could tell, not the slightest satisfaction from seeing his most dire predictions fulfilled.
situation
▪ This dire situation exists despite a welter of management plans, royalties, taxes, and fees.
▪ When it comes to day-to-day operations, the increasingly dire situation cries out for hard-nosed decisions and solid business management.
strait
▪ For those in truly dire straits, bankruptcy is sometimes the only option.
▪ The result is a society that was in dire straits because its cannibalism turned against itself, involving even small children.
▪ Everton, to put it bluntly, are in dire straits.
▪ He had had little idea of the dire straits prevailing at Berwick nor that time had all but run out.
warning
▪ The dire warnings of world shortages have not come to pass.
▪ And still, where Fergie's behaviour merely offered dire warnings - Never misbehave.
▪ Several of these additives contain dire warnings of quite nasty effects, particularly upon certain groups of susceptible persons.
▪ The dire warning came yesterday from Stansted Airport's marketing director Colin Hobbs.
▪ Minutes later a reprieve arrived - a dire warning to all teetotallers!
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
be in dire straits
▪ Everton, to put it bluntly, are in dire straits.
▪ The result is a society that was in dire straits because its cannibalism turned against itself, involving even small children.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ The situation doesn't seem as dire as you described it.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ That too often meant that jobs went abroad to places with very low wages and dire standards of living.
▪ The conditions may sound wonderful, but they can have dire consequences.
▪ The overwhelming impression left by the survey is one of dire poverty.
▪ The threats were dire enough to make the Republicans look reckless when they refused to budge.
▪ Usually these reports concentrate on prophecies of a forthcoming Armageddon but many also describe a dire contemporary situation.