Literary notes about tautness (AI summary)
The term “tautness” in literature is employed to evoke a sense of controlled tension and precision, whether describing physical objects, emotional states, or mental attitudes. Authors use it to portray physical rigidity or the exactness of objects—for instance, the trim condition of a yacht’s rigging [1], the careful adjustment of frames [2] or the maintained tightness of stretched material [3, 4]. It similarly conveys a heightened emotional or psychological state: characters’ expressions or nerves are depicted with a tension that borders on vibrancy, as with the strained alertness of a face or body posture [5, 6, 7, 8, 9], even suggesting a readiness to react under pressure. Beyond the concrete, “tautness” captures more abstract concepts, such as the intensity of intellectual energy [10] or the meticulous control of emotion and conviction [11, 12]. This versatility allows writers to illustrate the interplay between physical and mental states while reinforcing a mood of refined tension throughout their narratives [13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31].
- But the very trimness and tautness of everything on board proved the yacht's final undoing.
— from Flower of the Gorse by Louis Tracy - These are formed of two long wooden screws, fitted with movable nuts, which adjust the width of the frame and the tautness of the stretched work.
— from Embroidery and Tapestry Weaving by Grace Christie - When the proper tautness was obtained, he fixed the pelt to another board with pegs of wood, and hung it to dry.
— from The Wilderness Trail by Francis William Sullivan - The ropes lose their tautness and sag of their own weight.
— from A Vagabond Journey Around the World: A Narrative of Personal Experience by Harry Alverson Franck - His sudden face went from the tautness of his last speech to fear.
— from Captives of the Flame by Samuel R. Delany - He stood with a strained tautness, staring feverishly at the chronometer.
— from Competition by James Causey - Conscious of the tautness of his own nerves, strung like quivering violin strings.
— from Astounding Stories, February, 1931 by Various - Parish Thornton was breathing his words through lips that scarcely moved as he bent forward with the tautness of a coiled spring.
— from The Roof Tree by Charles Neville Buck - His fingers gripping the chair arms threatened to betray him by their tautness and he could feel cold perspiration dripping down his body.
— from A Pagan of the Hills by Charles Neville Buck - Murchison enjoyed the grappling of difficulties, that keen tautness of the intellect that vibrates to necessity.
— from A Woman's War: A Novel by Warwick Deeping - Neither did he have enough tautness of conviction concerning certain terrible doctrines to meet the emergency of her dogmatic needs.
— from A Circuit Rider's Wife by Corra Harris - There is a strangeness, a kind of mental tautness, a never-ceasing etiquette, about them all."
— from The London Venture by Michael Arlen - There was a tautness in the lines that made one feel they would twang with delicate music if the wind swept its hand more rapidly across them.
— from A Prisoner in Fairyland (The Book That 'Uncle Paul' Wrote) by Algernon Blackwood - By having cut the cords, around which the chain had been passed, he had relieved the tautness, and was now able to do what he promised.
— from The Bright Face of Danger Being an Account of Some Adventures of Henri de Launay, Son of the Sieur de la Tournoire by Robert Neilson Stephens - "He will?" she repeated, like one marvelling, in the tautness of every nerve and muscle, that she had the power of speech.
— from Over the Pass by Frederick Palmer - "Well," said Fraser with a tautness in his voice, "I've got several thousand dollars saved up, and Juan Martinez will help.
— from Sentiment, Inc. by Poul Anderson - Dalgetty, poised in a nervous tautness that could explode into physical strength, felt a clutch of fear.
— from The Sensitive Man by Poul Anderson - There was a sudden tautness in the situation between Flagg and Kyle, and the crowd noted it.
— from Joan of Arc of the North Woods by Holman Day - Braceway was amazed by the intensity of Bristow's glance, the tautness of his body, the harsh authority in his voice.
— from The Winning Clue by James Hay - There is no charged electricity to things, no tautness or leathery tightness to individual seconds.
— from Point Spread Poems by Paul Cameron Brown - She felt again the muscles of his forearms snap into tautness as he stood silent under her father's insults.
— from The Tyranny of Weakness by Charles Neville Buck - All this tautness, this numbness, was strength.
— from Nothing of Importance A record of eight months at the front with a Welsh battalion, October, 1915, to June, 1916 by Bernard Adams - The uproar of the wind, singing on the ropes strung by its own force to tautness, was like the shrieking of an immense and untuned harp.
— from A Madcap Cruise by Oric Bates - He came to, blinking, and realized that despite the tautness of his nerves he had been exhausted enough to sleep.
— from The Mystery of the Iron Box A Ken Holt Mystery by Bruce Campbell - The mother gave a sigh of relief, but she did not interrupt, nor did she relax the tautness of her body.
— from Kennedy Square by Francis Hopkinson Smith - The tautness of the spore-packed envelope grew greater.
— from The Forgotten Planet by Murray Leinster - All at once the tautness went out of her, and Sira leaned against the wall, divided between laughing and crying.
— from The Martian Cabal by Roman Frederick Starzl - One should have a sense of the firmness or tautness of the abdominal muscles and not of flabby relaxation.
— from How to Live: Rules for Healthful Living Based on Modern Science by Irving Fisher - Claire was conscious of tautness of the cords of her neck in front; of a pain at the base of her brain.
— from Free Air by Sinclair Lewis - The tautness as one set of muscles extended her hand toward the door and another set tore it away.
— from Address: Centauri by F. L. (Floyd L.) Wallace - To me, strung up to a tautness of sensation that almost frightens me, this silence of the Mate is horrible.
— from An Ocean Tramp by William McFee
