Literary notes about tract (AI summary)
The word "tract" appears with a remarkable range of meanings in literature. In some instances it denotes an expanse of land, describing everything from barren deserts and open grounds to extensive country regions—illustrated in portrayals of a riverside area or a vast, cultivated expanse [1, 2, 3]. In other contexts it refers to a written work, often with a religious or polemical tone, such as writings addressing scriptural matters or controversial themes [4, 5, 6]. Furthermore, the term is employed in medical and anatomical descriptions to signify parts of the body like the digestive or genito-urinary tract [7, 8, 9]. Through these varied uses, "tract" serves as a multifaceted term that enriches both geographical and conceptual discussions in literature [10].
- The place was a tract of open ground near the river side, just outside the edge of the forest, and surrounded by rocks and shrubbery.
— from Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll - Leaving Smyrna, the river Hermus forms a tract of plains, and gives them its own name.
— from The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 1 (of 6) by the Elder Pliny - On the right was a tract of land, partly meadow and partly moor, reaching, at its remote verge, to a wide undulating upland.
— from Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy - However, he was not happy; he had read a passage in the Talmud, tract Megillah 24 b, which troubled him.
— from Some Jewish Witnesses For Christ by Aaron Bernstein - An unknown writer of a polemical tract against Montanism dedicates his work to one Avircius Marcellus, at whose instigation it was written.
— from St. Paul's Epistles to the Colossians and Philemon by J. B. Lightfoot - (See the little tract, "Martyrs of Jesus.")
— from Some Jewish Witnesses For Christ by Aaron Bernstein - Balsam of Gurjun is a stimulant of the mucous membranes, especially [ 41 ] those of the genito-urinary tract, and is diuretic.
— from The Medicinal Plants of the Philippines by T. H. Pardo de Tavera - Cinnamon renders good service in therapeutics as a stimulant of the digestive tract and a heart tonic.
— from The Medicinal Plants of the Philippines by T. H. Pardo de Tavera - In other words, no causative relationship or parallelism could be observed between the emptying of the intestinal tract and the development of scurvy.
— from Scurvy, Past and Present by Alfred F. Hess - There he was, with the pen still between his fingers, and a vast, immeasurable tract of written space behind him!
— from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
