Literary notes about tense (AI summary)
The term “tense” is employed in literature with a versatility that spans both emotional description and grammatical function. On one hand, it conveys an atmosphere of anxiety or tightness in physical or emotional states, as characters’ muscles tighten in moments of stress or anticipation—illustrated when a character’s stiff demeanor or strained expression mirrors inner turmoil [1][2][3]. On the other hand, “tense” is a fundamental grammatical concept used to indicate the time of an action, detailing various forms such as past, present, and future, and their nuanced applications in both direct and indirect discourse [4][5][6]. This duality not only enriches narrative texture, providing vivid sensory and psychological imagery [7][8], but also ensures precise communication of temporal relations within the text.
- She quivered, and quivered, like a tense thing that is struck.
— from The Rainbow by D. H. Lawrence - He went to the door, knocked, and waited with tense muscles and an aching brow.
— from Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy - Thornton's voice rang out, sharp in the tense silence.
— from The call of the wild by Jack London - Instead of using -bi- , as in the first and second conjugations, we use -ā- 1 in the first person singular and -ē- in the rest of the tense.
— from The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America by Thomas Jefferson - The form here is the past tense of the obsolete won, or wone, to dwell.
— from The Lady of the Lake by Walter Scott - Must , though originally a past tense, is in modern English almost always used as a present.
— from An Advanced English Grammar with Exercises by Frank Edgar Farley and George Lyman Kittredge - But her will was tense against them all the time.
— from The Rainbow by D. H. Lawrence - The frame has remained gross or awkward, while the face has taken on a tense expression, betraying loose and undignified habits of mind.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana
