Literary notes about transition (AI summary)
The term “transition” in literature serves as a multifaceted marker, functioning both as a narrative mechanism and a thematic symbol. It captures the passage from one idea or state to another, as seen when authors describe the subtle movement from an impression to a fully formed idea [1] or the evolution from one intellectual framework to another [2]. In narrative contexts, shifts in voice, mood, or character are often signposted with a deliberate transition [3, 4], signifying changes that are as momentary as a shift in tone [5, 6] or as profound as the transformation of social orders—from war to peace [7, 8], and from traditional to modern societal forms [9, 10]. Moreover, “transition” is employed to illustrate both physical and metaphysical alterations, whether it be the gradual change of historical periods [11] or the personal metamorphosis of identities [12].
- By this double relation of impressions and ideas, a transition is made from the one impression to the other.
— from A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume - GENERAL REMARK On the Transition from Rational Psychology to Cosmology.
— from The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant - After a time she said: “About love,” a transition less abrupt than it appeared.
— from Howards End by E. M. Forster - And so by a natural transition Pope comes to speak of his own satiric poems and their aims.
— from The Rape of the Lock, and Other Poems by Alexander Pope - Then, with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his usual character, he said, in pity for his former self, “Poor boy!” and cried again.
— from A Christmas Carol in Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas by Charles Dickens - Then, with a rapidity of transition very foreign to his usual character, he said, in pity for his former self, 'Poor boy!'
— from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens - It is obvious that the transition from war to peace must present a more considerable problem than the reverse, i.e., the transition from peace to war.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - The transition from peace to war is thus not distinguished by a special sociological situation.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - The age was one of transition from the exuberance and vigor of Renaissance literature to the formality and polish of the Augustan Age.
— from English Literature by William J. Long - Historians have noted and emphasized the relation of the printing press to the transition from medieval to modern society.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - This style of architecture prevailed until about the middle of the twelfth century, when the Transition Norman became in vogue.
— from English Villages by P. H. Ditchfield - If you weaken either the union or resemblance, you weaken the principle of transition, and of consequence that belief, which arises from it.
— from A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume
