Literary notes about individual (AI summary)
In literature, the term "individual" is deployed in a range of contexts, often highlighting both the singular uniqueness of a person and their role within a larger collective. It can denote the isolated experience of personal revelation or confinement, as when one is portrayed as a solitary being confronting personal destiny ([1], [2]), while in other contexts it underscores the attributes and behaviors that distinguish a person from the mass ([3], [4]). Moreover, the word is employed in philosophical and sociological discussions to examine the tension between personal freedom and societal duty, encapsulating both personal identity and the broader interplay between an individual and the state ([5], [6]). This multifaceted usage reflects literature’s enduring interest in exploring what it means to be uniquely human in a complex social fabric.
- An account of an individual kept in a dungeon from early childhood, to about the age of seventeen.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. Burgess and Robert Ezra Park - But what shall we say, when an individual discovers a revelation addressed to himself alone, on the same vast sheet of record.
— from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne - He’s the only man I see in this institution that has an individual mind.
— from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce - The individual effort might fail, but not the human joy.
— from The Rainbow by D. H. Lawrence - The individual totem which belongs to the individual and does not descend to his successors.
— from Totem and Taboo by Sigmund Freud - What is best for the State must be suffered by the individual.
— from The Social Contract & Discourses by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
