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Literary notes about ethereal (AI summary)

In literature, the term "ethereal" is frequently employed to evoke a sense of otherworldly beauty, delicate refinement, and spiritual transcendence. Authors use it to describe not only characters imbued with a light, delicate quality—at times almost celestial in their allure ([1], [2], [3])—but also to articulate moods and natural phenomena that seem to transcend the tangible world ([4], [5], [6]). In some instances, it conveys an impression of a refined soul or the intangible grace of an environment, as well as a subtle but poignant contrast to the material realm ([7], [8], [9]). Thus, "ethereal" serves as a powerful literary device to suggest that which is beautifully refined, elusive, and imbued with a higher, almost mystical essence.
  1. To live out in the wilds under one roof with that ethereal creature and not fall in love is beyond the power of man.
    — from Project Gutenberg Compilation of Short Stories by Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
  2. It was an idealized Ruth he had loved, an ethereal creature of his own creating, the bright and luminous spirit of his love-poems.
    — from Martin Eden by Jack London
  3. She was not less fair, perhaps, than she had been before; and the ethereal character of her beauty had only been increased by time.
    — from A True Friend: A Novel by Adeline Sergeant
  4. Her idea of love was more that of placid affection, serving the loved one softly in an atmosphere, flower-scented and dim-lighted, of ethereal calm.
    — from Martin Eden by Jack London
  5. whose glory fills the ethereal throne, And all ye deathless powers!
    — from The Iliad by Homer
  6. Or summer's noontide air, while thus he spake:— "Thrones and Imperial Powers, Offspring of Heaven, Ethereal Virtues!
    — from Paradise Lost by John Milton
  7. The Esquimaux believe that “the soul exhibits the same shape as the body it belongs to, but is of a more subtle and ethereal nature.”
    — from The Golden Bough: A Study of Magic and Religion by James George Frazer
  8. Astral beings enjoy the ethereal music of the spheres and are entranced by the sight of all creation as exhaustless expressions of changing light.
    — from Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda
  9. Yet there was nothing ethereal about it; all was real vitality, real warmth, real incarnation.
    — from Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman by Thomas Hardy

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