a state of ill-being due to affliction or misfortune
"the misery and wretchedness of those slums is intolerable"
Great unhappiness; extreme pain of body or mind; wretchedness; distress; woe.
"The storm brought such misery to the coastal village that families huddled together in fear and cold."
In plain English: Misery is an intense feeling of sadness, pain, and unhappiness that makes you want to cry or give up.
"The storm brought deep misery to everyone living in that small town."
Usage: Use "misery" to describe intense suffering rather than mild discomfort, and avoid using it as a verb. It often pairs with intensifiers like "pure" or "great" to emphasize the depth of the unhappiness.
The word misery comes from the Latin miser, meaning "wretched," which was combined with a suffix in Middle English to form our modern term. It entered the language via Old French, carrying its original sense of extreme suffering or unhappiness directly into English usage.