Literary notes about abject (AI summary)
In literature, "abject" is a potent descriptor used to convey states of degradation, despair, and submission. Authors employ the term to depict both internal emotions and external conditions, ranging from the personal suffering of characters to the broader societal phenomena of poverty and servility. For instance, it underscores the dehumanizing aspects of subjection and impoverishment, as in the portrayal of maternal subjection and extreme poverty ([1], [2]). At the personal level, novelists evoke raw feelings of terror, humiliation, and weakness by describing characters’ abject attitudes or internal collapse ([3], [4], [5]). Moreover, classical works contrast lofty ideals with abject conditions of servility and moral decline, thereby enriching the narrative with a stark commentary on human vulnerability ([6], [7], [8]).
- Many a mother has been reduced to a condition of abject subjection through her affection for a son or a daughter.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - He says of them: "The Finns are extremely wild, and live in abject poverty.
— from Kalevala : the Epic Poem of Finland — Complete - "A characteristic, but not exactly complimentary, congratulation," returned Laurie, still in an abject attitude, but beaming with satisfaction.
— from Little Women; Or, Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy by Louisa May Alcott - To my abject heart!” She snatched up a glass from the table, emptied it at a gulp, lifted it in the air and flung it on the floor.
— from The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - Because Smerdyakov is a man of the most abject character and a coward.
— from The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - They have no actual sovereign, but merely two traditionary beings, to whom they bow with most abject servility.
— from Roget's Thesaurus by Peter Mark Roget - O noble lord, bethink thee of thy birth, Call home thy ancient thoughts from banishment, And banish hence these abject lowly dreams.
— from The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare - After him, the lords of the Eastern world were reduced to the most abject misery, and exposed to the blows and insults of a servile condition.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
