Literary notes about aperture (AI summary)
In literature, “aperture” often signifies much more than a mere physical opening; it suggests a threshold between contrasting realms. It is employed literally in descriptions of narrow doorways or peep-holes that allow one to glimpse distant characters or hidden spaces, as when Hugo lets a character view another’s cell from a slight gap ([1]) or Burroughs highlights a tiny door amid mighty walls ([2]). Beyond its concrete use, writers also harness the word to evoke transitions between light and darkness or interiority and exteriority—Dumas’s depiction of daybreak entering a tent ([3]) and Poe’s illustration of a flickering light within a confined space ([4]) serve to deepen atmosphere and tension. In some texts, aperture becomes a metaphor for sensorial passageways or even carries provocative connotations, illustrating its versatility in shaping both mood and meaning in narrative discourse ([5],[6]).
- In this manner Marc Dufraisse through the aperture could see M. du Rémusat in the opposite cell to his own.
— from The History of a Crime by Victor Hugo - It showed no aperture in the mighty walls other than the tiny door at which I sank exhausted, nor was there any sign of life about it.
— from A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs - The first rays of daybreak penetrated the aperture of the tent as Winter re-entered it.
— from Twenty years after by Alexandre Dumas and Auguste Maquet - Through the aperture in the wall I could see the top of a tree touched with gold and the warm blue of a tranquil evening sky.
— from The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells - Of course, all this was preliminary to the grand attack he meant afterwards to make on the virgin aperture in young Dale’s bottom.
— from The Romance of Lust: A classic Victorian erotic novel by Anonymous - If it be desired that the Instrument bear a larger aperture, that may be also done by composing the Speculum of two Glasses with Water between them.
— from Opticks : by Isaac Newton
