Literary notes about restlessness (AI summary)
In literature, "restlessness" is often deployed as a vivid marker of inner turmoil as well as external agitation. Authors use the term not only to depict physical unease or nervous energy—as seen when characters pace or manifest a palpable lack of calm [1] [2]—but also to symbolize deeper emotional or existential disquiet, a yearning for change or escape from internal constraints [3] [4]. This multifaceted usage can highlight the instinctive impulses of individuals, revealing the conflict between societal expectations and personal desires [5] [6]. In broader narratives, restlessness becomes emblematic of revolutionary spirit or the subtle, sometimes disquieting, stirrings of the human conscience, imbuing narratives with both tension and transformative potential [7] [8].
- Mumps lay down at once, and made no sign of restlessness when his master left the room.
— from The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot - Frank was standing by her, but not steadily; there was a restlessness, which shewed a mind not at ease.
— from Emma by Jane Austen - Is it that human restlessness For ever carps, condemns, pursues?
— from Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] by Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin - A great restlessness was in her and it expressed itself in two ways.
— from Winesburg, Ohio: A Group of Tales of Ohio Small Town Life by Sherwood Anderson - The real reason is that you have a restlessness in your heart characteristic of inbred sin.
— from The Heart-Cry of Jesus by Byron J. Rees - For years that quiet company had mocked his restlessness, his desire for change and freedom.
— from Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton - To this fact is to be attributed in large part the restlessness, the thirst for novelty and excitement so characteristic of modern life.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - "If she has, and her restlessness appears to suggest it, I should be more than glad to assist her with advice."
— from The Enchanted April by Elizabeth Von Arnim
