Literary notes about Obsolete (AI summary)
In literature, "obsolete" is often employed to contrast the past with the present, highlighting customs, words, practices, or regulations that have fallen out of use. Writers use the term to evoke nostalgia or to critique elements deemed outdated, whether referring to archaic language ([1], [2]), defunct legal rules ([3], [4]), or traditional customs that no longer sustain their original relevance ([5], [6]). This deliberate use of "obsolete" enriches the text by underscoring cultural and historical transitions—from the fading nuances of earlier eras to the evolving standards of modern society ([7], [8], [9]).
- Those who used affected language, or adopted obsolete words, he despised, as equally faulty, though in different ways.
— from The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete by Suetonius - As a romantic poet, Spenser often preferred archaic and semi-obsolete language to more modern forms.
— from Spenser's The Faerie Queene, Book I by Edmund Spenser - An old law, long obsolete, has been discovered, which, it seems, was passed two or three hundred years back.
— from Fox's Book of Martyrs by John Foxe - But this regulation has become obsolete, and the whole installation and investiture are now performed by the Grand Master.
— from The Principles of Masonic Law by Albert Gallatin Mackey - A custom called the Coolstrin is now apparently obsolete, unless in occasional rural communities remote from railroads.
— from British Goblins: Welsh Folk-lore, Fairy Mythology, Legends and Traditions by Wirt Sikes - Nor did he spare Tiberius, who was fond of obsolete and far-fetched expressions.
— from The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete by Suetonius - When the grants of the Divine Julius and Augustus were produced to him, he only said, that he was very sorry they were obsolete and out of date.
— from The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete by Suetonius - Obsolete regulations were revived and enforced.
— from The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 by A. T. Mahan - Gradually, as a rule, one of these forms comes to be generally preferred, and the less customary form comes to look obsolete and is discarded.
— from The Elements of Style by William Strunk
