Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The practice of stage-players; stage-playing; acting.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Theatrical representation; acting; affectation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Histrionic behaviour.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • And with the histrionism of strong emotion she pointed to a corner of the kitchen.

    Lay Morals 2005

  • I began to feel that my own personality had somehow slipped away from me, and those dead people, evoked from their graves by an old woman's histrionism, seemed more real to me than my living, breathing self.

    Aunt Jane of Kentucky Eliza Calvert Hall

  • Judged from the standard of European histrionism, the plot is weak from the sameness and repetition of the theme.

    The Philippine Islands John Foreman

  • Does not the change consist rather in the outer form and in the ideas expounded than in the spirit of the histrionism and mimicry?

    The Dramatic Values in Plautus Wilton Wallace Blanck�� 1916

  • And, in fact, every shred of evidence, however scant, goes to show that the histrionism must have been conceived in a spirit of extreme liveliness, abandon and extravagance in gesture and declamation, that would not confine the actor to faithful portrayal in character, but would allow him scope and license to resort to any means whatsoever to bestir laughter amongst a not over-stolid audience.

    The Dramatic Values in Plautus Wilton Wallace Blanck�� 1916

  • And we can instance scene upon scene where the self-evident padding can either furnish an excuse for agile histrionism, or become merely tiresome in its iteration [161].

    The Dramatic Values in Plautus Wilton Wallace Blanck�� 1916

  • Cheever gasped, then rushed his lie with sickly histrionism:

    We Can't Have Everything Rupert Hughes 1914

  • It had its faults, of course -- floridness, pomposity, too much histrionism.

    Yet Again Max Beerbohm 1914

  • There was something, too, about this blending of fashionables and farmers, which made me think of the theater; for there is, in truth, a distinct note of histrionism about many of the rich Americans who "go in for" elaborate ruralness, and there is a touch of it very often, also, about "horsey" people.

    American Adventures A Second Trip 'Abroad at home' Julian Street 1913

  • The trained nurse, who had rushed down-stairs and into the garden, now reached her side and drastically checked Genevieve Maud's histrionism by spreading a spacious palm over the wide little mouth.

    Many Kingdoms Elizabeth Garver Jordan 1907

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