Literary notes about lofty (AI summary)
In literature, "lofty" is a versatile adjective that conveys both physical height and elevated ideals. It is used to describe towering structures and majestic landscapes—as in depictions of grand mountains and expansive halls ([1], [2], [3], [4], [5])—while also suggesting elevated character, inspiration, or ambition. The term imbues descriptions with a sense of grandeur and nobility, whether illustrating the elevated spirit of a revolutionary hero or portraying the inspired abstractions of high moral or intellectual aspirations ([6], [7], [8], [9]). Authors from a wide range of periods and styles, from Homer and Virgil to Dickens and Dumas, employ "lofty" to evoke both tangible grandeur and the intangible qualities of exalted ideals ([10], [11], [12]).
- The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty.
— from The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe - The room was large, and very light and lofty.
— from Anna Karenina by graf Leo Tolstoy - Very fine roads and lofty, overlooking the whole town, the harbor, and the sea-beautiful views.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain - The lofty gateways are graced with statues, and the broad floors are all laid in polished flags of marble.
— from The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain - Here Sleep halted, and ere Jove caught sight of him he climbed a lofty pine-tree—the tallest that reared its head towards heaven on all Ida.
— from The Iliad by Homer - I honour endurance, perseverance, industry, talent; because these are the means by which men achieve great ends and mount to lofty eminence.
— from Jane Eyre: An Autobiography by Charlotte Brontë - "Drink to lofty hopes that cool Visions of a perfect State: Drink we, last, the public fool, Frantic love and frantic hate.
— from The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson by Baron Alfred Tennyson Tennyson - It is a lofty ideal that redeems the life from the curse of commonness and imparts a touch of nobility to the personality.
— from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden - To me who have known all that is fine and grand in the lofty aspirations of love, if I ever fall in love, it will assuredly be in love of that nature.
— from Reflections; or Sentences and Moral Maxims by François duc de La Rochefoucauld - The lord of thunders, from his lofty height Beheld, and thus bespoke the source of light: "Behold!
— from The Iliad by Homer - The rafters are with brazen cov’rings crown’d; The lofty doors on brazen hinges sound.
— from The Aeneid by Virgil - He is no such dolt as you suppose.' 'A genius, perhaps?' 'You sneer, perhaps; and you take a lofty air upon yourself perhaps!
— from Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
