The Literary Sublime

Edmund Burke describes the sublime as "whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger... Whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror." This blog will showcase the literary sublime through passages in various texts. It will also feature definitions of beautiful words and book news.

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Words You Might Not Know

Meretricious - adjective 1. Of or relating to a prostitute 2. Tawdrily and falsely attractive 3. Pretentiously attractive

[circusfolk]

Love at the lips was touch As sweet as I could bear; And once that seemed too much; I lived on air

That crossed me from sweet things The flow of—was it musk From hidden grapevine springs Down hill at dusk?

I had the swirl and ache From sprays of honeysuckle That when...

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Book Art by Issac Salazar

[circusfolk]

We almost suspect that he exposed himself to erotic temptations throughout his life because only despairing rejection of them could inspire his true passions.

Patrick Suskind, On Love & Death 

[bookshavepores]

[the-deepest-ocean]

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The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

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Words You Might Not Know

Cuirass - noun

A piece of armor consisting of breastplate and backplate fastened together.

A hard protective cover on an animal.

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Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson