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Literary notes about fortune (AI summary)

Literature employs the word fortune in a variety of nuanced ways, ranging from material wealth to the abstract notion of chance and fate. In many works, fortune signifies accumulated riches and financial success, as when a writer gains considerable fortune through his connections ([1]) or inherits a vast estate ([2]). At the same time, fortune is personified as an unpredictable force that governs the rise and fall of men—an agent whose favor can lead to triumph or despair, as seen in the capricious twists of destiny described in philosophical and epic texts ([3], [4]). Poets and novelists also explore fortune as an almost tangible presence that bestows both blessings and burdens on its recipients, suggesting that its gifts are as ephemeral as they are transformative ([5], [6]). Thus, the concept of fortune in literature elegantly bridges the concrete and the metaphysical, underscoring both human ambition and the inexorable forces of chance.
  1. He acquired a considerable fortune by his writings and by his connexion with persons of eminent rank.
    — from The Geography of Strabo, Volume 3 (of 3) by Strabo
  2. His uncle had died, leaving him a fortune, and he had left the army, yet he could stoop to treat five men as he had treated us.
    — from The Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle
  3. [“Fortune rules in all things; it advances and depresses things more out of its own will than of right and justice.”
    — from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne
  4. Had fortune my last hope betrayed, This packet, to the King conveyed, Had given him to the headsman’s stroke, Although my heart that instant broke.
    — from Marmion: A Tale Of Flodden Field by Walter Scott
  5. may kinder stars Upon thy fortune shine; And may those pleasures gild thy reign, That ne'er wad blink on mine!
    — from Poems and Songs of Robert Burns by Robert Burns
  6. [303] Her claws : Dante speaks of Fortune as if she were a brutal and somewhat malicious power.
    — from The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri: The Inferno by Dante Alighieri

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