Literary notes about serenity (AI summary)
Literature often employs the word serenity to evoke an ideal of calmness and inner balance, whether describing a character’s countenance or the atmosphere of a setting. It is used to capture a refined, watchful intellectual calm as in Goethe’s depiction of artistic sensibility [1], or to portray an unruffled, almost heroic composure under pressure [2, 3, 4]. Serenity is equally at home in nature, where it lends a sense of undisturbed beauty to landscapes and sunsets [5, 6], and in contemplative works that extol the virtues of patience and self-mastery [7, 8, 9]. Across these varied uses, the term consistently points to a state of equilibrium and peace—whether through the peaceful demeanor of a character [10, 11] or the harmonious ambiance pervading a scene [12, 13].
- Goethe's Hellenism was of another order, the Allgemeinheit and Heiterkeit, the completeness and serenity, of a watchful, exigent intellectualism.
— from The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry by Walter Pater - They did not know which was most worthy of admiration, his pallor or his serenity.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo - Bathsheba, a small yawn upon her mouth, took the pen, and with off-hand serenity directed the missive to Boldwood.
— from Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy - But when his Serenity took command everything became straightforward.
— from War and Peace by graf Leo Tolstoy - Here and there water shone like silver, and beyond, the land rose into blue undulating hills, and so faded into the serenity of the sky.
— from The Time Machine by H. G. Wells - That night was a beautiful serenity; save for one planet, the moon seemed to have the sky to herself.
— from The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells - But I cannot see how any men should ever transgress those moral rules, with confidence and serenity, were they innate, and stamped upon their minds.
— from An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1 by John Locke - That exquisite poise of character, which we call serenity is the last lesson of culture, the fruitage of the soul.
— from As a man thinketh by James Allen - SERENITY CALMNESS of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.
— from As a man thinketh by James Allen - The atmosphere was serenity itself; I was enraptured.
— from Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda - I turn my head, and see it, in its beautiful serenity, beside me.
— from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens - The day was ending in a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance.
— from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad - Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity became less brilliant but more profound.
— from Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
