animate, enliven, invigorate, liven, liven up, sharpen

forceful, bluntest, frank, forthright, blunter, dismissive, brusque, succinct, stinging, pithy, candid, scathing, undiplomatic, sarcastic, unstatesmanlike, strident, terse, acerbic, brash, tactful, glib, circumspect, schoolmarmish, barbed, trenchant, withering, abrasive, unsubtle, unvarnished, outspoken, persuasive, eloquent, harsh, conciliatory, subtle, unsparing, vehement, combative, caustic, straightforward, flippant, placatory, snide, deadpan, nuanced, sharp, verbose, lawyerly, dispassionate, confrontational, unapologetic, sharpened, defiant, vitriolic, wry, waspish, curt, articulate, lacerating, brusk, rhetorical, bombastic, pugnacious, condescending, intemperate, stark, prickly, praiseful, vituperative, sly, unemotional, vague, folksy, gruff, jokey, cryptic, unquotable, plainspoken, cagey, jocular, savage, phlegmatic, honest, impolitic, fiery, effusive, bristled, bellicose, ineloquent, nonchalant, churchillian, laconic, pragmatic, cavalier, insouciant, sobering, minatory, dour, unkindest, accusatory, provocative, delphic, barry, byron, duncan, fitzgerald, gordon, hastings, percy, preston, russell, arthur, clifford, countess, dickinson, douglas, elizabeth, finn, francis, gay, hamilton, pointed, blunted, hooked, obtuse, spatulate, curved, incurved, sharppointed, truncate, tipped, honed, recurved, angled, stubby, beveled

break, damp, dampen, obtund, petrify, soften, weaken

bluffly, blunted, bluntly, bodkin, brickbat, brusquely, butt shaft, cold turkey, common ax, common axe, corona, dayton ax, dayton axe, downright, drop arch, dull, dulled, emerald shiner, flat out, frankness, grampus, grampus griseus, leaf-nosed snake, notropis atherinoides, obtuse leaf, outspokenness, porpoise, pug-nose, pug-nosed, roundly, schnauzer, snub-nosed, starkly, stubby, threader, well-meant, worm lizard

alter, change, desensitize, weaken

benumb, candid, crude, deaden, direct, dull, forthright, frank, free-spoken, numb, outspoken, plainspoken, point-blank, pointless, stark, unconditional, unpointed