Literary notes about beguile (AI summary)
Beguile carries a rich dual resonance in literary language, often connoting both charm and deception. It is used to suggest the power to seduce or misdirect, as when a captivating gaze attracts and enthralls ([1]) or when a character’s manner masks a more duplicitous intent ([2], [3]). At times, beguiling serves to provide a pleasant diversion from monotony, distracting the mind from tedium or pain ([4], [5], [6]), while in other contexts it embodies the subtle interplay between appearance and reality, where genuine virtue is juxtaposed against underlying vice ([7], [8]). Whether in playful banter or in more tragic explorations of self-deception and manipulation ([9], [10]), beguile enriches narrative layers by evoking the transient, sometimes treacherous, allure of artful persuasion.
- The extraordinary intensity of his gaze seemed to attract it, beguile it, and draw it more surely than if he had it in tow!
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas: An Underwater Tour of the World by Jules Verne - Thou dost beguile the world, unbless some mother.
— from Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare - "Mentor," he cried, "do not let Ulysses beguile you into siding with him and fighting the suitors.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - He lay in bed wakeful and restless, and took a book to beguile the tedious hours.
— from The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon by Washington Irving - while away the time, beguile the time; kill time, dally.
— from Roget's Thesaurus by Peter Mark Roget - My spirits grow dull, and fain I would beguile The tedious day with sleep.
— from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare - VOLT: So much more full of danger is his vice, That can beguile so under shade of virtue.
— from Volpone; Or, The Fox by Ben Jonson - To beguile the time, Look like the time; bear welcome in your eye, Your hand, your tongue; look like the innocent flower, But be the serpent under it.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare - DESDEMONA I am not merry; but I do beguile The thing I am, by seeming otherwise.— Come, how wouldst thou praise me?
— from Othello, the Moor of Venice by William Shakespeare - Swervings like these from the strict line of fact often beguile a truthful man on and on until he eventually becomes a liar.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain
