Literary notes about VORTEX (AI summary)
In literature, "vortex" functions as a potent metaphor for irresistible, often overwhelming forces that pull characters or societies into spiraling chaos or profound transformation. It appears both as a literal, physical phenomenon—evoking images of swirling water, smoke, or dark natural forces [1] [2] [3]—and as a figurative device to describe tumultuous psychological states, social upheaval, or the compelling nature of fate [4] [5] [6]. Authors use the term to impart a sense of inevitability and loss of control, whether depicting an individual's descent into despair or a society being inexorably drawn into the maelstrom of change [7] [8].
- Directly under him in the stern the screw snarled incessantly in a vortex of boiling water that forever swirled away and was lost in the darkness.
— from Vandover and the Brute by Frank Norris - It was a narrow, sharp rock, that jutted out about two feet from the bank, quite close to the vortex of the whirlpool.
— from Martin Rattler by R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne - Suddenly, at a turn of the road, we saw a vortex of smoke.
— from The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsène Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar by Maurice Leblanc - This strong and ruling faculty was like a powerful star, which, in the violence of its course, drew all things within its vortex.
— from The Iliad by Homer - Raoul dressed in frantic haste, prepared to forget his distress by flinging himself, as people say, into "the vortex of pleasure."
— from The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux - The divine afflatus usually lasted a week or two, and then she emerged from her "vortex," hungry, sleepy, cross, or despondent.
— from Little Women; Or, Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy by Louisa May Alcott - Soon in the midst of the vortex around me I was conscious of a certain loneliness.
— from White Nights and Other Stories by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - The legislative department is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity, and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex.
— from The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton and John Jay and James Madison
