What's the difference between awe and enthrall?

Awe


Definition:

  • (n.) Dread; great fear mingled with respect.
  • (n.) The emotion inspired by something dreadful and sublime; an undefined sense of the dreadful and the sublime; reverential fear, or solemn wonder; profound reverence.
  • (v. t.) To strike with fear and reverence; to inspire with awe; to control by inspiring dread.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) "I wanted it to have a romantic feel," says Wilson, "recalling Donald Campbell and his Bluebird machines and that spirit of awe-inspiring adventure."
  • (2) I have had the awe-inducing pleasure of standing alone among the giant trees, both sequoias and redwoods, and hearing nothing but the chatter of the squirrels and the high wind in the tallest branches.
  • (3) Let’s leave that discussion to another day, but imagine a combination of the two – sort of Transformers meets Ex Machina – in which a race of giant sexy robots battles it out with another race of really mean giant sexy robots while paltry human beings look on in awe, and teenage boys (and girls) experience incredibly conflicting and disturbing sensual awakenings in the front row of the Beckenham Odeon.
  • (4) But as a professional engineer, Alwash admits to having been in awe at what Saddam's men had done.
  • (5) An activist has discipline, goals and strategy.” Amy K. Nelson (@AmyKNelson) Amazing scene here at QuickTrip: exiled Tibetan monks here & people are in awe, hugging them, wanting photos.
  • (6) From where he stood, the Real Madrid coach watched in awe as barely metres away Gareth Bale started the sprint that ended with him scoring what he admitted was the "biggest" goal of his career: a 50-metre gallop that won the Copa del Rey for Real Madrid .
  • (7) The world is in awe of China’s relentless capacity to produce gargantuan cities, each outdoing the most recent superlative that describes its predecessor.
  • (8) He’s sensitive, intelligent, rather awe-inspiring and slightly frightening, but he is a real person, you can get really involved in him.
  • (9) One day they hope to recreate a full-size, ocean-going replica Roskilde 6, and send it across the sea to awe rather than to terrorise the coasts of the British Isles.
  • (10) Are we fighting for a better understanding of what is going on in our sport or are we trying to get power?’” Saddique Shaban (@SaddiqueShaban) No let up in Kenyan athletes siege at Roadha House as besieged officials watch in awe.
  • (11) But it was awe-inspiring to watch Rivers try: she had the stamina of someone (several someones) a fraction of her age.
  • (12) Of course a father looking at the ultrasound image of his gestating, 20-week-old daughters is going to feel love and awe and the majesty of life, and deeply feel that those are his babies and that they are people.
  • (13) Despite pressure from leaders in Europe and across the world – from David Cameron to Barack Obama – the ECB has resisted calls for a "shock and awe" intervention in the bond markets to support countries such as Italy and Spain, which have seen their borrowing costs soar in the past two weeks.
  • (14) A surgical intervention is dangerous for the old patient awing to the reduced reactiveness and polymorbity.
  • (15) Malton says she is "in awe" of how he goes about the work.
  • (16) The right has spent almost every moment of the last six years painting leftists as people gazing in blissful awe at Obama.
  • (17) When Spielberg asked him to design the mothership for the climax of Close Encounters, the artist drew on a dream from years earlier, in which he had seen an awe-inspiring spacecraft with pipes and stairways jutting out from its underside.
  • (18) He liked the band, and we gave him $10,000, which was probably a big influence.” Their second (far more unlikely) collaboration with P-Funk main man Clinton was such a success that the mere mention of his name sends the band into a love-glow of awe.
  • (19) Only a rare few have accomplished this noble journey and can attest to the feeling of awe that accompanies such a moment in one’s life.
  • (20) Yet in the face of the country’s political and media establishment warning Greeks to vote yes – echoing every major European leader (and quite a few faceless ones) – and the shock-and-awe tactics of the European Central Bank in pulling the plug on Greek banks , the country still delivered a loud no to austerity, troika-style.

Enthrall


Definition:

  • (v. t.) To hold in thrall; to enslave. See Inthrall.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Regardless of one’s political leanings, the resulting images are spellbinding – to quote Guardian correspondent Toby Manhire: “The album, which has been publicly made available on Facebook , is enthralling.
  • (2) It takes your heart a little bit.” He had everyone enthralled.
  • (3) Ibrahimovic, so languid, had looked an embarrassment at times in this enthralling team, but everything Barça created began from the back.
  • (4) It took Maria Sharapova , four majors to the good and five years older, three hours and two minutes to subdue the 22-year-old over three enthralling sets.
  • (5) He remembers picking up an atlas (he was very interested in maps) and becoming enthralled by a solar system diagram at the back.
  • (6) She has sold more records than any other woman, enthralled fans at the Super Bowl and starred on the big screen as Eva Perón.
  • (7) But here we have an enthralling MLS playoff between perennial regular season titans Sporting Kansas City and, how should we put this, an overachieving New England Revolution.
  • (8) He was by turn patient, stubborn and just too damn good, winning a contest marked by swearing, stare-downs, minor tantrums, an odd time violation and some artful tennis on a chill, still night on Rod Laver Arena, with the man himself among an enthralled audience.
  • (9) Koenig’s original investigation has become a more awkward, enthralling, aggravating investigation into the nature of truth.
  • (10) Then there were the imported dramas broadcast because they were weighty, such as 1984's Heimat , an enthralling dramatisation of ordinary lives in 20th-century Germany.
  • (11) But just as Oliver Stone has managed to make a boring sequel to Wall Street, despite the real Wall Street's enthralling and nigh-on-cinematic recent wickedness (the inner Freudian torment of boring Shia LaBoeuf's boring character is apparently more interesting to Stone – once the great purveyor of conspiracy theories – than the near-collapse of capitalism), so the makers of the upcoming films about Facebook have missed an obvious trick with their movies.
  • (12) This was an enthralling stalemate both managers felt they could have won, but each seemed content with a point earned largely through excellent performances from defenders prepared time and again to throw their bodies on the line.
  • (13) The 2014 NCAA March Madness tournament opened with an enthralling upset that saw the sixth-seeded Ohio State Buckeyes beaten by their neighbours from Dayton.
  • (14) On July 14, France's glamorous presidential couple enthralled the world.
  • (15) As an enthralling, thrilling, romantic, beautiful, fun, weird piece of art, few things have felt more relevant.
  • (16) While Westminster was enthralled by the eruption over the policy between Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg and former Department for Education special adviser Dominic Cummings – with accusations flying that Clegg wanted Cummings charged under the official secrets act – school heads say they have been left to fend for themselves in parts of the country.
  • (17) That’s how, five years after I lost my friend, I gave away most of my belongings and bought a one-way ticket to San Francisco , the setting of Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City, which had long enthralled me.
  • (18) In the mid 70s, the couple met Jackson Browne, who was immediately enthralled by Zevon's music.
  • (19) He could enthrall you with his lifelong passion for William Blake, his new-found interest in gardening, his arguments for proportional representation.
  • (20) By this point, the faithful are enthralled, the curious baffled and the traditionalists utterly bemused.