enthrall
Other forms: enthralls
When something is so fascinating that it holds all your attention, it is said to enthrall — whether it's a thrilling action-adventure film, a breathtaking work of art, or even the person you have a crush on.
If you’ve even fallen under someone’s spell, it won’t surprise you to learn that when enthrall first entered the English language it carried the meaning of “to hold in mental or moral bondage” or “to enslave.” Nowadays the verb enthrall is used to describe something so wonderful and captivating that the person experiencing it feels like a slave. If you enthrall someone, you make them powerless — in a sense, a slave to your charms.
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hold spellbound
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Vocabulary lists containing enthrall
After emigrating from Barbados to Connecticut Colony, sixteen-year-old Katherine (Kit) Tyler finds herself at odds with her Puritan neighbors, which turns dangerous when she befriends a Quaker woman accused of being a witch.
When Edna Pontellier meets Robert Lebrun, she begins to question her roles as wife and mother. Set in New Orleans in the late 1800s, this pioneering novel is considered to be an early feminist classic. Read the full text here.