Red is used in literature as a vibrant emblem of both tangible and abstract intensities. It appears in heraldic contexts to evoke honor and rivalry, as with commanding badges of York and Lancaster [1], while also coloring natural and supernatural landscapes like the glowing horizon or ominous sunsets [2]. The word conveys human emotion as well—red cheeks signal passion or anger [3, 4]—and it often symbolizes life’s dualities, such as the interplay between spirituality and corporeality [5] or the balance between danger and beauty in settings like the Red Sea [6, 7, 8]. Moreover, red can serve as a marker of identity, revolutionary zeal, or even whimsical detail, enriching narratives with layers of meaning [9, 10, 11].
- The well-known badges of the white and red roses of York and Lancaster have been already referred to, and Fig.
— from A Complete Guide to Heraldry by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies
- I searched in vain until the upper rim of the great red sun was just disappearing behind the horizon
— from A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
- You look quite red, as if you had been about some mischief: what were you opening the window for?”
— from Jane Eyre: An Autobiography by Charlotte Brontë
- His cheeks were red, his brow was all crinkled with anger, and the veins stood out at his temples with passion.
— from Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
- The red man divided mind into two parts,—the spiritual mind and the physical mind.
— from The Soul of the Indian: An Interpretation by Charles Alexander Eastman
- But their waters of choice are the Red Sea and the Mediterranean near the Greek Islands or the coast of Syria.
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas: An Underwater Tour of the World by Jules Verne
- Pharao's chariots and his army he hath cast into the sea: his chosen captains are drowned in the Red Sea.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete
- And he rebuked the Red Sea and it was dried up: and he led them through the depths, as in a wilderness.
— from The Bible, Douay-Rheims, Complete
- He had pictured red letters of curious revenge.
— from The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War by Stephen Crane
- His hosts were most polite; for the cultivator's wife had told them of his vision of the Red Bull, and of his probable descent from another world.
— from Kim by Rudyard Kipling
- Beneath every spark, The red, tyrannous fire Mounts up in the dark Ever redder and higher; More swiftly than steed Uncontrolled, see it pass!
— from Poems by Victor Hugo