Literary notes about midnight (AI summary)
Literary authors often employ “midnight” not merely as an indicator of time but as a rich, symbolic color that evokes profound darkness and mystery. For example, a farmhouse’s cheerless atmosphere is compared to the “dull” hue of a forest at midnight, suggesting an absence of light and vitality ([1]). In poetic imagery, the sky’s blackness is rendered “as black as midnight,” providing a vivid simile that ascribes a tangible, almost tactile quality to darkness ([2]). Other works describe the setting as being “enveloped in midnight gloom,” or even items as if “cut from the midnight moon,” both phrases that imbue the scenes with a deep, velvety, and shadowed tone ([3], [4], [5]). This use of “midnight” as a color enriches the visual and emotional texture of literary landscapes, inviting readers to perceive darkness as a nuanced and evocative presence.
- That pleasant old farm house, once so happy, was as dull as the forest at midnight.
— from Tales from the Operas - The sky seemed as black as midnight, except when the vivid sheets of lightning glared and shot across it; and the peals of thunder were loud and long.
— from The Old Bell of Independence; Or, Philadelphia in 1776 by Henry C. (Henry Clay) Watson - His sword hung gleaming by his side, And, on his arm, the lion's hide Scattered across the midnight air
— from The Astronomy of the Bible An Elementary Commentary on the Astronomical References of Holy Scripture by E. Walter (Edward Walter) Maunder - Resembling more a taper placed under a bushel than a light set upon a hill, they left the surrounding region enveloped in midnight gloom.
— from Monks, Popes, and their Political Intrigues by John Alberger - And tip the edges of the waves with shifts And spots of whitest fire, hard like gems Cut from the midnight moon they were, and
— from Men, Women and Ghosts by Amy Lowell
