Literary notes about rent (AI summary)
The word "rent" in literature unfolds with a rich duality. On one hand, it vividly describes a physical tearing or splitting, as when a fabric, garment, or even the very sky is rent asunder to evoke dramatic rupture and emotional intensity ([1], [2], [3], [4], [5]). On the other hand, it retains its conventional meaning referring to a monetary fee paid for the use of property, a notion that frequently appears in narratives exploring social, economic, and even pastoral themes ([6], [7], [8], [9]). This versatility not only bridges the tangible with the abstract but also deepens the thematic layers and imagery across diverse literary traditions ([10], [11], [12], [13]).
- Next to Anchiale are the mouths of the Cydnus 255 at the Rhegma, (the Rent,) as it is called.
— from The Geography of Strabo, Volume 3 (of 3) by Strabo - The steward held his left arm in a scarf, as if it had been rent and torn in twain.
— from Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais - He said, and acting what no words could say, Rent from his head the silver locks away.
— from The Iliad by Homer - She looked at the scales on the walls, two brands smoking end to end, and a long spider crawling over her head in a rent in the beam.
— from Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert - And behold the veil of the temple was rent in two from the top even to the bottom: and the earth quaked and the rocks were rent.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete - “‘Do you consider,’ said his companion to him, ‘that you will be obliged to pay three months’ rent and to lose the produce of your garden?
— from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley - the rent of a house, which, over and above paying the ground-rent, affords six or six and a-half per cent.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith - Paying only three dollars for room rent seemed ridiculous.
— from Sister Carrie: A Novel by Theodore Dreiser - Since then the only incident in his life was when he moved, in 1868, because his landlord had tried to raise his rent.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant - A rent, therefore, reserved in corn, is liable only to the variations in the quantity of labour which a certain quantity of corn can purchase.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith - They broke the seal; He rent the veil, and revealed the spirit.
— from Pascal's Pensées by Blaise Pascal - Houses in it, worth, in ordinary times, a thousand livres of yearly rent, yielded as much as twelve or sixteen thousand.
— from Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay - They fall indifferently upon every species of revenue, the wages of labour, the profits of stock, and the rent of land.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
