Literary notes about current (AI summary)
The word "current" in literature wears many hats, describing both the tangible power of flowing water and the intangible surge of ideas, trends, and energies. In some works it vividly captures the relentless force of rivers and streams that carve landscapes and determine fate—as when a formidable current carries a vessel or sweeps away obstacles [1, 2, 3, 4]. In technical and scientific contexts, it becomes a precise term in discussions of electricity and mechanical motion, where a current drives motors or induces magnetic fields [5, 6, 7, 8]. Moreover, "current" is employed metaphorically to signify what is prevalent or widely accepted in a particular time or society, from prevailing opinions and customs to the zeitgeist of an era that shapes personal and communal identity [9, 10, 11, 12]. This layered usage enriches narrative texture by allowing authors to evoke both the unstoppable force of nature and the dynamic pulse of cultural life within a single, versatile term.
- A strong current sweeps through it, and it is remarkable that all of its houses have not gone before.
— from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain - Mr. Parkman says: 'Before them a wide and rapid current coursed athwart their way, by the foot of lofty heights wrapped thick in forests.'
— from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain - Nobody could stay on our forecastle; the water swept across it in a torrent every time we plunged athwart the current.
— from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain - The current bore him along and he rapidly receded from the shore.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne - No more relation could he discover between the steam and the electric current than between the Cross and the cathedral.
— from The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams - The principle employed is the effort of a coil through which a current passes to draw an iron rod into its centre.
— from How it Works by Archibald Williams - A high-tension current is induced by the coil in the secondary circuit, indicated by dotted lines.
— from How it Works by Archibald Williams - The electric current may be short circuited by dropping a crow-bar or poker on the wire.
— from Boy Scouts Handbook by Boy Scouts of America - All progress is initiated by challenging current concepts, and executed by supplanting existing institutions.
— from Mrs. Warren's Profession by Bernard Shaw - And I said, "My cousin Amy, speak, and speak the truth to me, Trust me, cousin, all the current of my being sets to thee."
— from The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson by Baron Alfred Tennyson Tennyson - It will be seen, then, that at the moment when Maurice Joly wrote his Dialogues , the ideas they embodied were current in many different circles.
— from Secret societies and subversive movements by Nesta Helen Webster - But of such considerations enough: let us now proceed to the current maxims respecting Pleasure.
— from The Ethics of Aristotle by Aristotle
