Literary notes about hap (AI summary)
The word "hap" has been employed by authors over the centuries as a multifaceted term that primarily denotes chance, fortune, or luck. In many texts it functions as a noun—capturing both the randomness of events and their sometimes fated nature—appearing in compound forms like “hap-hazard” to emphasize unpredictability in outcomes ([1], [2], [3]). Its usage ranges from describing the serendipity of love and encounters, as seen when a fortunate meeting or even a matrimonial adventure is depicted ([4], [5]), to underscoring the capricious twists of life in moments of crisis or triumph ([6], [7], [8]). Authors like Robert Burns, Walter Scott, and Mark Twain illustrate this dual sense of everyday chance and significant destiny, blending humorous lightness with existential gravity ([9], [10], [11]). Thus, "hap" functions as a linguistic marker of life's inherent unpredictability, reflecting how chance plays an essential role in both minor happenings and the grand tapestry of fate.
- Well! 'tis all hap-hazard when one weds.
— from Don Juan by Baron George Gordon Byron Byron - Of course these few exceptional later mems are far, far short of one's concluding history or thoughts or life-giving—only a hap-hazard pinch of all.
— from Complete Prose Works by Walt Whitman - A great number were carried off at hap-hazard, according as they fell into their hands.
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy - But bear in mind that thou art not alone, If fortune hap again to bring thee near Where people such debate are carrying on.
— from The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: The Inferno by Dante Alighieri - You have heard of this daughter, whom all the young men in Padua are wild about, though not half a dozen have ever had the good hap to see her face.
— from Mosses from an old manse by Nathaniel Hawthorne - because I am good and occupy myself not with such toys, I suffer ill and ill hap.
— from The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio by Giovanni Boccaccio - Why, we were almost in the Valley of the Shadow of Death; but that, by good hap, we looked before us, and saw the danger before we came to it.
— from The Pilgrim's Progress from this world to that which is to come by John Bunyan - I were to blame an I thought that that might ever hap.”
— from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain - Hap, a wrap, a covering against cold.
— from Poems and Songs of Robert Burns by Robert Burns - Every good hap to you that chances here.
— from Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare - List to what I say—follow every word—I am going to bring that morning back again, every hap just as it happened.
— from The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain
