Literary notes about downcast (AI summary)
The term "downcast" is often used to evoke a sense of inner melancholy and reflective despair by describing a lowered gaze or dejected expression. Many authors employ it to punctuate moments when characters feel overwhelmed by sorrow or internal conflict, as seen when faces reveal the weight of mournful hearts ([1]) or when eyes, heavy with unspoken grief, search the world in silence ([2], [3]). This poignant descriptor serves not only to detail a physical posture but also to mirror emotional states—be it in quiet resignation, shame, or deep disillusionment—thereby enriching the narrative with layers of human vulnerability and empathy ([4], [5], [6]).
- It looked on downcast faces, the images of mournful hearts.
— from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe - But Miao Shan only listened in silence with downcast eyes.
— from Myths and Legends of China by E. T. C. Werner - Letting her arms fall helplessly, she sat with downcast eyes and pondered.
— from War and Peace by graf Leo Tolstoy - There is nothing which examines like a downcast eye.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo - I know them intimately, I have almost made a study of their faces, and am delighted when they are gay, and downcast when they are under a cloud.
— from White Nights and Other Stories by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - The utterance of this last question was hurried and low, and the downcast eyes and burning blush too plainly showed that she, at least, had felt it.
— from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë
