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Literary notes about greatest (AI summary)

The word "greatest" in literature is often used as a superlative marker that elevates a quality, action, or status to the highest degree. Authors employ it to stress efficiency, importance, or emotional intensity—for instance, Melville underscores "the greatest efficiency" in a practical sense ([1]), while Wilde and Rousseau apply it to denote deep personal bonds or challenges, as in "our greatest friend" ([2]) and "the greatest of the tutor’s difficulties" ([3]). It can signal eminence in achievement or influence, such as becoming "one of the greatest living merchants" ([4]) or recognizing someone's unrivaled expertise ([5]). At times, "greatest" conveys extreme conditions of both positive and negative natures, whether celebrating peak accomplishments or highlighting significant dangers and misfortunes ([6]). This multifaceted usage enriches the narrative by drawing attention to the pinnacle of experience, status, or emotion within different contexts.
  1. To insure the greatest efficiency in the dart, the harpooneers of this world must start to their feet from out of idleness, and not from out of toil.
    — from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville
  2. You are our greatest friend, Lord Goring.
    — from An Ideal Husband by Oscar Wilde
  3. Perhaps this is the greatest of the tutor’s difficulties.
    — from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
  4. From this he went up and up until he became one of the greatest living merchants.
    — from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden
  5. If you can muzzle that one and put him on a chain I’ll be ready to swear you are the greatest detective of all time.”
    — from The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
  6. Elizabeth had caught the scarlet fever; her illness was severe, and she was in the greatest danger.
    — from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

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