SELF-REPROACH

Pronunciation (US): (GB):

I. (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The act of blaming yourself

Synonyms:

self-reproach; self-reproof

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("self-reproach" is a kind of...):

reproach (a mild rebuke or criticism)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A feeling of deep regret (usually for some misdeed)

Synonyms:

compunction; remorse; self-reproach

Classified under:

Nouns denoting feelings and emotions

Hypernyms ("self-reproach" is a kind of...):

regret; rue; ruefulness; sorrow (sadness associated with some wrong done or some disappointment)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "self-reproach"):

guilt; guilt feelings; guilt trip; guilty conscience (remorse caused by feeling responsible for some offense)

penance; penitence; repentance (remorse for your past conduct)

Credits

Context examples:

In this world the penalty is less equal than could be wished; but without presuming to look forward to a juster appointment hereafter, we may fairly consider a man of sense, like Henry Crawford, to be providing for himself no small portion of vexation and regret: vexation that must rise sometimes to self-reproach, and regret to wretchedness, in having so requited hospitality, so injured family peace, so forfeited his best, most estimable, and endeared acquaintance, and so lost the woman whom he had rationally as well as passionately loved.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

She felt all the force of that comparison; but not as her sister had hoped, to urge her to exertion now; she felt it with all the pain of continual self-reproach, regretted most bitterly that she had never exerted herself before; but it brought only the torture of penitence, without the hope of amendment.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

For myself, I felt so much self-reproach and contrition for my part in what had happened, that nothing would have enabled me to keep back my tears but the fear that Steerforth, who often looked at me, I saw, might think it unfriendly—or, I should rather say, considering our relative ages, and the feeling with which I regarded him, undutiful—if I showed the emotion which distressed me.