| He has staked out his claim for being a great critic through portentousness, pomposity, and extravagant pretension, and, from all appearances, seems to have achieved it. |
| Few books about spirituality are so devoid of portentousness or pretense. |
| But it is also a hugely celebratory collective insanity, a world away from the portentousness and individualism of much current hip-hop and rock. |
| Moving away from allegory and portentousness and into more lyrical and fantastical realms, Messer at the same time sticks closer to home for subject matter. |
| Believers in propaganda by deed, usually choose to invest themselves with portentousness by selecting an anniversary that will freight their murder with meaning. |
| Journalists take perfectly good stories and pump them full of air and portentousness with a view to winning a Pulitzer prize. |
