Literary notes about somnolence (AI summary)
Writers often deploy the term somnolence to evoke not only physical drowsiness but also a pervasive sense of lethargy that can mirror social, emotional, or even existential decay. It is used to describe characters succumbing to a gloomy state or an almost meditative stupor, as when an individual drops into a torpid haze after an encounter with distressing events [1, 2]. At times somnolence functions as a metaphor, symbolizing the idle inertia of a community or the waning vigour of a society, much like the quiet, encroaching calm of a fading day or a cultural lull [3, 4]. In this way, the word enriches narratives by casting moments of pause as both literal and figurative gateways to deeper reflections on life’s transient nature [5, 6].
- He dropped into a sort of gloomy somnolence.
— from Catherine De Medici by Honoré de Balzac - These constant and secret researches into matters occult gave to Etienne’s life the apparent somnolence of meditative genius.
— from The Hated Son by Honoré de Balzac - Now the rows of whalers rotting at New Bedford's wharves, and the somnolence of Nantucket, tell of its virtual demise.
— from American Merchant Ships and Sailors by Willis J. (Willis John) Abbot - Some constitutions plunge the citizens into a lethargic somnolence, and others rouse them to feverish excitement.
— from Democracy in America — Volume 1 by Alexis de Tocqueville - Just when his slumbers had deepened into snoring somnolence, the archæologist was aroused by a sonorous bass voice that boomed like a bell.
— from The Mesa Trail by H. (Henry) Bedford-Jones - And behind this condition of deep somnolence there come signs of recovery—or, in religious parlance, "Salvation."
— from The Will to Power: An Attempted Transvaluation of All Values. Book I and II by Nietzsche
