Literary notes about smug (AI summary)
In literature, "smug" is often employed as a nuanced descriptor to capture a character's self-satisfied, sometimes condescending demeanor. It serves both as a literal observation of facial expression and as a marker of an inner, complacent pride. At times, it highlights ironic contrasts between outward appearances and internal character, as when a character is noted for his “smug little smile” [1] or even described in terms that equate his pristine self-regard to that of a “smug bridegroom” [2]. The term also frequently appears in social commentary, suggesting not merely individual vanity but a broader, often derided, bourgeois complacency [3][4]. Whether in depictions of a self-important villain or a character caught in the trappings of superficial confidence, literary uses of "smug" invite readers to question the deeper contradictions of pride and pretension [5][6][7][8].
- 28 Mom raised her eyebrows and smiled a smug little smile.
— from Cottage on the Curve by Mary Lamers - I will die bravely, like a smug bridegroom.
— from The Tragedy of King Lear by William Shakespeare - A half-century of this in America has made us smug and content.
— from The Pursuit of God by A. W. Tozer - On the whole, they give at first approach not so much the impression of wild savages as of smug and self-satisfied bourgeois.
— from Argonauts of the Western Pacific by Bronislaw Malinowski - "They only get away with it because the normals feel smug compared to the abnormals.
— from Little Brother by Cory Doctorow - I can think of nothing more devastating, more utterly smug than that hideous style—cabinets covered all over with swans' heads, like bath-taps!"
— from Swann's Way by Marcel Proust - How far I had leaped in either case beyond the smug shallow-pate-gossip of optimism contra pessimism!
— from The Birth of Tragedy; or, Hellenism and Pessimism by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche - Shylock submitted to all these indignities with a patient shrug; but deep in his heart he cherished a desire for revenge on the rich, smug merchant.
— from Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by E. Nesbit and William Shakespeare
