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Literary notes about Actually (AI summary)

The word "actually" often serves as a marker for asserting facts, rectifying misconceptions, or emphasizing genuine occurrence in literature. Darwin’s detailed observation, noting that whale progenitors “did actually possess mouths” [1], exemplifies its use in underscoring scientifically relevant detail, while Herzl’s brief correction in “It might be so, but actually it is not” [2] demonstrates its function to counter presumptions. In narrative dialogue, as seen in Dickens’ work [3] or Ibsen’s character questioning another’s audacity [4], the term lends immediacy and authenticity. It is also employed in philosophical or technical discussion to stress that descriptions align with reality, for instance when detailing what is “actually the fact” [5] or clarifying processes [6]. Across both narrative and expository texts, "actually" works to reinforce the truth of a statement and subtly guide the reader’s understanding of the depicted reality.
  1. I hope that I may not be misconstrued into saying that the progenitors of whales did actually possess mouths lamellated like the beak of a duck.
    — from The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin
  2. It might be so, but actually it is not.
    — from The Jewish State by Theodor Herzl
  3. There is such an uneasiness in Paris, that we have actually a run of confidence upon us!
    — from A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
  4. What the devil!—have YOU actually the face to come into my house? Hovstad.
    — from An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen
  5. For, say they, we assert what is actually the fact, but we do not describe its character.
    — from The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius
  6. Accordingly, bps does not refer to the rate at which information is actually being transferred.
    — from The Online World by Odd De Presno

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