sorrow

drown (one's) sorrow(s)

To attempt to forget one's troubles through the consumption of something, typically alcohol (to which the phrase originally referred). It's not healthy to just drown your sorrows every time a girl breaks up with you. Quit drinking and try to face reality. Whenever I have a hard week at work, I like to spend Friday night drowning my sorrow in pizza and ice cream.
See also: drown

more in sorrow than in anger

Primarily motivated by sadness, even though appearing angry. Oh, I'm sure she said that more in sorrow than in anger—she's still reeling from her husband's death, after all.
See also: anger, more, sorrow

share (one's) sorrow

1. To commiserate with one about the same or similar loss, disappointment, or misfortune. A: "I lost nearly everything during the economic crash." B: "I share your sorrow. I had to shutter the business my great-grandfather built because of the crash." We're going down to the bar with the other laid-off workers to share their sorrow.
2. To relate one's loss, disappointment, misfortune, or the source thereof to someone else. You should keep all that grief bottled up inside. It's important to share your sorrow with someone who can help you learn how to cope with it. It was nearly a year after her father died that Sarah finally shared her sorrow with me.
See also: share, sorrow

sorrow over (someone or something)

To grieve or lament for someone or something; to be full of sorrow because of someone or something. I know you miss him, but you need to stop sorrowing over Jonathan and start living your life again. People sorrowing over the results of the election need to get ahold of themselves. This is not the end of the world as we know it.
See also: over, sorrow
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

drown one's troubles

 and drown one's sorrows
Fig. to try to forget one's problems by drinking a lot of alcohol. Bill is in the bar, drowning his troubles. Jane is at home, drowning her sorrows.
See also: drown, trouble

share someone's sorrow

to grieve as someone else grieves. We all share your sorrow on this sad, sad day. I am sorry to hear about the death in your family. I share your sorrow.
See also: share, sorrow

sorrow over someone or something

to grieve or feel sad about someone or something. There is no need to sorrow over Tom. He will come back. He is sorrowing over the business he has lost because of the weather.
See also: over, sorrow
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.

drown one's sorrows

Drink liquor to escape one's unhappiness. For example, After the divorce, she took to drowning her sorrows at the local bar. The notion of drowning in drink dates from the late 1300s.
See also: drown, sorrow

more in sorrow than in anger

Saddened rather than infuriated by someone's behavior. For example, When Dad learned that Jack had stolen a car, he looked at him more in sorrow than in anger . This expression first appeared in 1603 in Shakespeare's Hamlet (1:2), where Horatio describes to Hamlet the appearance of his father's ghost: "A countenance more in sorrow than in anger."
See also: anger, more, sorrow
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.

drown your sorrows

If someone drowns their sorrows, they drink a lot of alcohol in order to forget something sad that has happened to them. He was in the pub drowning his sorrows after the break-up of his relationship.
See also: drown, sorrow
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed.

drown your sorrows

forget your problems by getting drunk.
See also: drown, sorrow

more in sorrow than in anger

with regret or sadness rather than with anger.
This is taken from Hamlet. When Hamlet asks Horatio to describe the expression on the face of his father's ghost, Horatio replies ‘a countenance more in sorrow than in anger’.
See also: anger, more, sorrow
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary

drown your ˈsorrows

(informal, often humorous) try to forget your problems or a disappointment by drinking alcohol: Whenever his team lost a match he could be found in the pub afterwards drowning his sorrows.
See also: drown, sorrow

do something more in ˌsorrow than in ˈanger

do something because you feel sad or sorry rather than angry: They said they were threatening legal action more in sorrow than in anger.
See also: anger, more, something, sorrow
Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary

drown (one's) sorrow

/sorrows
To try to forget one's troubles by drinking alcohol.
See also: drown, sorrow
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition.
See also:
  • drown (one's) sorrow(s)
  • drown one's sorrows
  • drown sorrow
  • drown your sorrows
  • drown troubles
  • drown (one's) troubles
  • drown the shamrock
  • (from) top to toe
  • a full-time job
  • be remembered as (something)
References in classic literature
They whispered sweet words of comfort,--how, if the darkened eyes could find no light without, within there might be never-failing happiness; gentle feelings and sweet, loving thoughts could make the heart fair, if the gloomy, selfish sorrow were but cast away, and all would be bright and beautiful.
Then went the Elves into the dreary prison-houses, where sad hearts pined in lonely sorrow for the joy and freedom they had lost.
"Dear child, tomorrow we must bear you home, for, much as we long to keep you, it were wrong to bring such sorrow to your loving earthly friends; therefore we will guide you to the brook-side, and there say farewell till you come again to visit us.
"I will never break another flower," cried Eva; " but let me go to them, dear Fairy; I would gladly know the lovely spirits, and ask forgiveness for the sorrow I have caused.
Flower Fables
That we should take counsel about what has happened, and when the dice have been thrown order our affairs in the way which reason deems best; not, like children who have had a fall, keeping hold of the part struck and wasting time in setting up a howl, but always accustoming the soul forthwith to apply a remedy, raising up that which is sickly and fallen, banishing the cry of sorrow by the healing art.
But when any sorrow of our own happens to us, then you may observe that we pride ourselves on the opposite quality--we would fain be quiet and patient; this is the manly part, and the other which delighted us in the recitation is now deemed to be the part of a woman.
If you consider, I said, that when in misfortune we feel a natural hunger and desire to relieve our sorrow by weeping and lamentation, and that this feeling which is kept under control in our own calamities is satisfied and delighted by the poets;-the better nature in each of us, not having been sufficiently trained by reason or habit, allows the sympathetic element to break loose because the sorrow is another's; and the spectator fancies that there can be no disgrace to himself in praising and pitying any one who comes telling him what a good man he is, and making a fuss about his troubles; he thinks that the pleasure is a gain, and why should he be supercilious and lose this and the poem too?
Republic
"I cannot describe to you the agony that these reflections inflicted upon me; I tried to dispel them, but sorrow only increased with knowledge.
Frankenstein
She knew that in me, sorrow could not be weakness, but must be strength.
In three months more, a year would have passed since the beginning of my sorrow. I determined to make no resolutions until the expiration of those three months, but to try.
It was a long and gloomy night that gathered on me, haunted by the ghosts of many hopes, of many dear remembrances, many errors, many unavailing sorrows and regrets.
David Copperfield
Assuredly I did not regret this circumstance: if sorrow had any place in my heart, it was that he was gone at last--that he was no longer walking by my side, and that that short interval of delightful intercourse was at an end.
Agnes Grey
Back to the spot where he had left Werper went the ape-man, joy in his heart now, where fear and sorrow had so recently reigned; and in his mind a determination to forgive the Belgian and aid him in making good his escape.
In the silence of mingled joy and sorrow they passed along through the familiar jungle, and as the afternoon was waning there came faintly to the ears of the ape-man the murmuring cadence of distant voices.
Forgotten were the sorrows and dangers of yesterday.
Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar