Literary notes about reckless (AI summary)
Literary writers often use "reckless" to convey a sense of bold abandon and unthinking audacity. In heroic epics, for instance, characters are depicted as daring to the point of disregarding life itself, embodying a valor that is both admirable and fraught with danger [1, 2, 3]. At times, the word underscores a character’s unchecked impulsivity—a disregard for consequences that can lead to personal downfall or social disruption [4, 5, 6]. In other contexts, "reckless" carries a dual tone, simultaneously celebrating a spirit of uninhibited courage and critiquing imprudent actions that border on the self-destructive [7, 8, 9]. This layered use enriches character portrayals and thematic explorations throughout the literature.
- 60 So any must act whenever he thinketh To gain him in battle glory unending, And is reckless of living.
— from Beowulf: An Anglo-Saxon Epic Poem - Sang the wizard, Lemminkainen, Screeched the reckless Kaukomieli,
— from Kalevala : the Epic Poem of Finland — Complete - Thus the reckless Lemminkainen, Thus the son of Kalevala, Was recovered from the bottom Of the Manala lake and river.
— from Kalevala : the Epic Poem of Finland — Complete - The feeling began and ended in reckless, vindictive, hopeless hatred of the man who was to marry her.
— from The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins - But his self-complacency seduced him into attempting a flight into regions of unexplored English, and the reckless experiment was his ruin.
— from The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain - He had lost his wife, was a man of reckless habits and all of a sudden shot himself, and in such a shocking way....
— from Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky - "Then I like to stay," said Godfrey, with a reckless determination to get as much of this joy as he could to-night, and think nothing of the morrow.
— from Silas Marner by George Eliot - A spy of that sort can afford to be more reckless than the most reckless of conspirators.
— from The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale by Joseph Conrad - As to destroying and plundering cities, let me say that great care should be taken that nothing be done in reckless cruelty or wantonness.
— from De Officiis by Marcus Tullius Cicero
