intense

adj

1. Of a characteristic: extreme or very high or strong in degree; severe; also, excessive, towering.

   “Nor was I yet able to passe through any of the narrower streets, but kept the widest; the ground and air, smoake and fiery vapour, continu'd so intense that my haire was almost sing'd, and my feete unsufferably surbated.”

   “[…] Nature had a robe of glory on, / And the bright air o'er every shape did weave / Intenser hues, so that the herbless stone, / The leafless bough among the leaves alone, / Had being clearer than its own could be, […]”

   “[…] Pietro di Medici then gave, at the period of one great epoch of consummate power in the arts, the perfect, accurate, and intensest possible type of the greatest error which nations and princes can commit, respecting the power of genius entrusted to their guidance.”

   “Floods in northern India, mostly in the small state of Uttarakhand, have wrought disaster on an enormous scale. The early, intense onset of the monsoon on June 14th swelled rivers, washing away roads, bridges, hotels and even whole villages.”

2. Of a thing: possessing some characteristic to an extreme or very high or strong degree.

   “[T]h' intense atom glows / A moment, then is quenched in a most cold repose.”

   “These pendent lamps and chandeliers are bright / As earthly fires from dull dross can be cleansed; / Yet could my eyes drink up intenser beams / Undazzled—this is darkness—when I close / These lids, i see far fiercer brilliances,— […]”

   “As the night came on the yellow stars grew more intense overhead, but the lambent glow in the north did not pale.”

3. Of feelings, thoughts, etc.: strongly focused; ardent, deep, earnest, passionate.

   “intense study”

   “intense thought”

   “No mortall nature can endure either in the actions of Religion, or ſtudy of VViſdome, vvithout ſometime ſlackning the cords of intenſe thought and labour: […]”

   “VVe found the Elector intenſe upon the ſtrengthening of his Army, […]”

   “The ceremony began vvith the exhortation of the Father-Abbot, delivered vvith ſolemn energy; then the novice kneeling before him, made her profeſſion, for vvhich Vivaldi liſtened vvith intenſe attention, but it vvas delivered in ſuch lovv and trembling accents, that he could not aſcertain even the tone.”

4. Of a person: very emotional or passionate.

   “The artist was a small, intense man with piercing blue eyes.”

   “Fair Æsthetic (suddenly, and in deepest tones, to Smith, who has just been introduced to take her in to Dinner). "Are you Intense?"”

5. (also, figuratively)Under tension; tightly drawn; strained, stressed, tense.