Definition of "exhilarating"

Mrs. Palmer added, "that this news, though it could scarcely be called exhilarating, had had such an effect on her elderly friends, that they had determined to set out to Bath, and, when rested, proceed thence to Exeter, in order to be nearer the place where the vessel was expected, and to be a support to Lord Meersbrook, in case of the worst."

1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], chapter LVII, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn, […], pages 109–110

What most delights us today in Candide is not the 'conte philosophique', nor its satire, nor the gradual emergence of a morality and vision of the world: instead it is its rhythm. With rapidity and lightness, a succession of mishaps, punishments and massacres races over the page, leaps from chapter to chapter, and ramifies and multiplies without evoking in the reader's emotions anything other than a feeling of an exhilarating and primitive vitality.

1991, Italo Calvino, “Candide, or Concerning Narrative Rapidity”, in Martin McLaughlin, transl., Why Read the Classics?, New York, N.Y.: Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, published 2014, page 103

Writing a "Treehouse of Horror" segment has to be both exhilarating and daunting. It's exhilarating because it affords writers all the freedom in the world.

2012 April 29, Nathan Rabin, “The Simpsons (Classic): ‘Treehouse Of Horror III’”, in The A.V. Club‎, archived from the original on 17 October 2016

"Like many other large resorts, the town operated electric tramways, with open-topped cars. The journey down the steep incline to the harbour must have been exhilarating at times, testing the brakes on the vehicles to the limit."

2021 September 8, Dr Joseph Brennan, “Electric tramways at the heart of our seaside story”, in RAIL, number 939, page 59