Definition of melancholy (Entry 1 of 2)
1a: depression of spirits : DEJECTION
great outbursts of creativity alternate with feelings of extreme melancholy
— Brenda Lane Richardson
Mitchell sounds utterly alone in her melancholy, turning the sadness into tender art.
— Rolling Stone
b: a pensive mood
a fine romantic kind of a melancholy on the fading of the year
— Richard Holmes
One white arm and hand drooped over the side of the chair, and her whole pose and figure spoke of an absorbing melancholy.
— Arthur Conan Doyle
2a: MELANCHOLIA sense 1
barchaic : an abnormal state attributed to an excess of black bile and characterized by irascibility or depression
