As a lifelong New Yorker, I am beyond despair at the brutal and fearsome place our city has become.

I was dead for want of sleep, and had gotten into a state beyond hope or despair.

In one sense, all of his work constitutes a desire to recognize and then move beyond catastrophe and despair - whether personal, social or historical.

She looked up at him with empty eyes, beyond hope or despair, no room in her face for anything but pain.

He was beyond hope or despair.

She did scream then, silently, beyond despair, as she waited for the door to open.

The place is utterly devastated, people are beyond despair.

Patrick nodded-he was beyond feeling sorrow or despair.

If only he could get beyond despair.

Styron stresses that even if you have reached "despair beyond despair", keep going.