Literary notes about lyre (AI summary)
The term “lyre” in literature is employed as both a literal musical instrument and a symbol loaded with mythic and artistic resonance. Classical works such as Homer's epics ([1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7]) frequently use the lyre to invoke the power of music in narrative, alluding to its divine heritage through figures like Apollo and Orpheus ([8], [9], [10]). Philosophers and poets, including those in the works of Plato ([11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17]) and Victor Hugo ([18], [19], [20]), employ the lyre as a metaphor for inspiration, order, and philosophical idealism. Romantic and Gothic writers such as Byron ([21], [22]) and Edgar Allan Poe ([23], [24], [25], [26], [27]) also turn to the lyre as an emblem of creative torment and sublime melancholy, further enriching its legacy as an instrument that bridges the human spirit with celestial harmony ([28], [29], [30]). This multifaceted usage across genres highlights the lyre’s capacity to evoke both the tangible beauty of music and the intangible allure of poetic inspiration.
- Demodocus has left his lyre at my house, so run some one or other of you and fetch it for him.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - " On this a servant hurried off to bring the lyre from the king's house, and the nine men who had been chosen as stewards stood forward.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - As soon as he touched his lyre and began to sing Telemachus spoke low to Minerva, with his head close to hers that no man might hear.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - He was standing near towards the trap door, 174 and held his lyre in his hand.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - He hung the lyre for him on a peg over his head, and showed him where he was to feel for it with his hands.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - Then Phemius took his lyre and set them all longing for sweet song and stately dance.
— from The Odyssey by Homer - Here a feast Was graved: to the shrill pipe and ringing lyre A band of blooming virgins led the dance.
— from The Iliad by Homer - 75 Apollo tuned the lyre; the Muses round With voice alternate aid the silver sound.
— from The Iliad by Homer - O for the Lyre of some Orpheus, to constrain, with touch of melodious strings, these mad masses into Order!
— from The French Revolution: A History by Thomas Carlyle - You would wonder very much should this be the head and lyre of Orpheus.
— from Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais - 394 A ; lord of the lyre, ib.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato - There remain then only the lyre and the harp for use in the city, and the shepherds may have a pipe in the country.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato - The lyre and the harp may be permitted in the town, and the Pan’s-pipe in the fields.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato - There remain then only the lyre and the harp for use in the city, and the shepherds may have a pipe in the country.
— from The Republic by Plato - Lyre, the instrument of Apollo, and allowed in the best state, 3. 399 D .
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato - , 402 E ; must only learn the Dorian and Phrygian harmonies, and play on the lyre and harp, ib.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato - The lyre and the harp may be permitted in the town, and the Pan's-pipe in the fields.
— from The Republic by Plato - Thou art my song and I the lyre; Thou art the breeze and I the brier; The altar I, and thou the fire; Mine the deep love, the beauty thine!
— from Poems by Victor Hugo - With you I'll breathe the air which ye respire, And, smiling, hide my melancholy lyre When it is wet with tears.
— from Poems by Victor Hugo - My lyre a voice shall be!
— from Poems by Victor Hugo - The company, whose birth, wealth, worth have cost My trembling lyre already several strings, Assembled with our hostess and mine host.
— from Don Juan by Baron George Gordon Byron Byron - And must thy lyre, so long divine, Degenerate into hands like mine?
— from Don Juan by Baron George Gordon Byron Byron - The proposition, in this form, will be admitted at once by those who love the lyre for its own sake, and for its spiritual uses.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - A mortal melody, While a bolder note than this might swell From my lyre within the sky.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - And when an hour with calmer wings Its down upon thy spirit flings— That little time with lyre and rhyme
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - That Israfeli’s fire Is owing to that lyre By which he sits and sings— The trembling living wire Of those unusual strings.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition by Edgar Allan Poe - The proposition, in this form, will be admitted at once by those who love the lyre for its own sake, and for its spiritual uses.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe — Volume 2 by Edgar Allan Poe - The whistle of the locomotive, more powerful than Amphion's lyre, was about to bid them rise from American soil.
— from Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne - GOOD FELLOW The rabble by such hate are held, To maim and slay delights them: As Orpheus' lyre the brutes compelled, The bagpipe here unites them.
— from Faust [part 1]. Translated Into English in the Original Metres by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - Vain of his skill, he challenged Apollo to a musical contest, he to play on the flute and Apollo on the lyre.
— from The Golden Bough: A Study of Magic and Religion by James George Frazer