Literary notes about Questionable (AI summary)
Writers employ "questionable" in a remarkably varied way, using it to evoke doubt, prompt moral inquiry, or simply cast a skeptical glance at personalities and procedures. In some texts it characterizes individuals or practices as dubious in character or intent—for instance, labeling a man as "questionable" in his notoriety or methods ([1], [2], [3]) or questioning the propriety of a scientific procedure or political maneuver ([4], [5], [6]). At times the term expresses uncertainty about outcomes or details, as seen when authors remark on the uncertain success of an enterprise ([7]) or raise doubts about a work’s dramatic power ([8]). Philosophical writings, too, find "questionable" a useful device, inviting readers to interrogate established values and assumptions ([9], [10]). In this way, "questionable" becomes a versatile, evocative word, enriching literature by signaling ambiguity, inviting reflection, and enhancing narrative tension ([11], [12], [13]).
- A questionable most blameable man; yet to us the far notablest of all.
— from The French Revolution: A History by Thomas Carlyle - “Yes, a marriage is being arranged—a marriage between a questionable woman and a young fellow who might be a flunkey.
— from The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - There was always something questionable about her.
— from The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot - Even if all students were embryonic scientific specialists, it is questionable whether this is the most effective procedure.
— from Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education by John Dewey - And some few politicians who had won to prominence through questionable methods were threatened with exposure if they did not side with the strikers.
— from Jim Waring of Sonora-Town; Or, Tang of Life by Henry Herbert Knibbs - The august Assembly finds the step questionable; invites him meanwhile to the honours of the sitting.
— from The French Revolution: A History by Thomas Carlyle - We were not used to dancing on an even keel, though, and it was only a questionable success.
— from The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain - [271] And now we may say this also of the catastrophe, which we found questionable from the strictly dramatic point of view.
— from Shakespearean Tragedy: Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth by A. C. Bradley - Unless it be that you have already divined of your own accord who this questionable God and spirit is, that wishes to be PRAISED in such a manner?
— from Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche - That is to say, as a thinker who regards morality as questionable, as worthy of interrogation, in short, as a problem?
— from Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche - For his worshippers too a most questionable thing!
— from On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History by Thomas Carlyle - I.89 Questionable shape, ] To question , in our author's time, signified to converse .
— from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare - Questionable, therefore, means capable of being conversed with.
— from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare