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Literary notes about execration (AI summary)

In literature, the term "execration" is employed to convey a forceful denunciation or curse, often charged with intense emotional or moral disgust. It is used to illustrate both personal malediction and broader societal condemnation, whether aimed at tyrannical laws and corrupt leaders [1][2], or as an expression of raw human fury in the midst of tumultuous scenes [3][4]. At times, the word carries a rhetorical flourish, underscoring the dramatic contrast between admiration and the deep contempt reserved for actions or individuals deemed unworthy [5][6]. Whether evoking the collective outcry of a community or the solitary mutter of an aggrieved figure [7][8], "execration" functions as a potent literary tool to dramatize the force of censure and to encapsulate the devastating impact of moral outrage.
  1. Their execration of the hated laws is none too strong, and their argument as a whole is masterly and unanswerable.
    — from History of the United States, Volume 2 by Elisha Benjamin Andrews
  2. Tell Davy this Cornwall is such a vile county, that nothing but its merit, as his birth-place, redeems it from utter execration.
    — from Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey by Joseph Cottle
  3. With a frightful yell of mingled hatred and execration, the seething human mass bore down upon him!
    — from We Two: A Novel by Edna Lyall
  4. De Bracy bowed low and in silence, and was about to withdraw, when the yeomen burst at once into a shout of execration and derision.
    — from Ivanhoe: A Romance by Walter Scott
  5. The pow'r of Patmore's placid pen, Or Watson's gift of execration, The sugar of Le Gallienne, Or Algernon's Alliteration.
    — from Perverted Proverbs: A Manual of Immorals for the Many by Harry Graham
  6. Wise and good men had tried and found him guilty of a crime which, in all ages, had been held in execration by mankind.
    — from Mark Hurdlestone; Or, The Two Brothers by Susanna Moodie
  7. Then indeed it did my heart good to hear the great unanimous roar of execration which went up from the multitude as I came out.
    — from The Red Axe by S. R. (Samuel Rutherford) Crockett
  8. Again he paused; but this time, to mutter an execration.
    — from Mirk Abbey, Volume 1 (of 3) by James Payn

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