serious-mindedness

Its impeccable serious-mindedness is nothing to scoff at; what some saw as ponderous now seems merely prescient.

2001: A Space Odyssey: No 1 Catherine Shoard 2010

Okay, maybe we have to be touching and be in the right frame of serious-mindedness.

Arcane Circle Linda Robertson 2011

Okay, maybe we have to be touching and be in the right frame of serious-mindedness.

Arcane Circle Linda Robertson 2011

His drily funny commentary can't hide a serious-mindedness, and he encourages, rather than undercuts, the reverence in which his once-anarchic comedies are now held.

John Cleese - review 2011

Okay, maybe we have to be touching and be in the right frame of serious-mindedness.

Arcane Circle Linda Robertson 2011

And one that breathes a pleasant wind of freshness and revolt in an era where we are constantly confronted with stupidity, cowardice, or simply the serious-mindedness of French ideological crowing.

Bernard-Henri Lévy: And Iran? Utopia's Understanding of the Word Culture. Hands up, With Romain Goupil 2010

They considered us so earnest, so ploddingly literal in all our endeavours, that they attempted to upend our serious-mindedness with light-as-a-feather irony, in which nothing they said seemed weighted with importance … even though everything they were telling you was consequential.

A Special Relationship Douglas Kennedy 2003

They considered us so earnest, so ploddingly literal in all our endeavours, that they attempted to upend our serious-mindedness with light-as-a-feather irony, in which nothing they said seemed weighted with importance … even though everything they were telling you was consequential.

A Special Relationship Douglas Kennedy 2003

I have little patience for that sort of Mrs. Jellyby serious-mindedness.

readersguide Diary Entry readersguide 2002

And at that moment all doubt of Betty's serious-mindedness departed.

The Man Thou Gavest