"Denouement" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... clarification, clearance, dispersion; interpretation, explanation, eclaircissement, denouement; exoneration, acquittal; assart. ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... a great land in the western ocean which we find in the ancient chronicles, so interwoven with narrative we know to be true, as to make it impossible not to attach a certain amount of credit to them. This particular story is the more interesting as its denouement, abruptly left in the blankest mystery by one Saga, is incidentally revealed to us in the course of another, relating to events with which the first had no connection. [Footnote: From internal evidence it is certain that the chronicle ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... excess of esprit, and the one in which fancy is the freest."[62] It was greeted by the public with enthusiasm, and even such severe critics of Marivaux as La Harpe could find little to say against it,—that it "lacked intrigue" and had a "weak denouement " possibly, but after all that he had made of Harlequin, "of that ideal personage, who up to that time had only known how to provoke laughter," an "interesting" character "by making him ...
— A Selection from the Comedies of Marivaux • Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux
... inquire. To this question the Buddhist replied with a smile: "Set your mind at ease," he said; "there's now in maturity a plot of a general character involving mundane pleasures, which will presently come to a denouement. The whole number of the votaries of voluptuousness have, as yet, not been quickened or entered the world, and I mean to avail myself of this occasion to introduce this object among their number, so as to ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... been able to elude all Baltimore's attempts at conversation—has refused all his demands for a dance, yet this same knowledge that the night will not go by without a denouement of some kind between her and him is terribly present to her. To-night! The last night she will ever see him, in all human probability! The exaltation that enables her to endure this thought is fraught with such agony that, brave and determined as she is, it is ...
— April's Lady - A Novel • Margaret Wolfe Hungerford
... who had kept silent at first hardly comprehending and then holding her breath at the denouement. "Hear me. Captain Alvarado's manner to me has been coldness itself. Nay, he scarcely manifested the emotion ...
— Sir Henry Morgan, Buccaneer - A Romance of the Spanish Main • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... the denouement being thus provided for, I immediately drop the fantastic for a tone of the most profound seriousness—this tone commencing in the stanza directly following the one last quoted, ...
— Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works • Edgar Allan Poe
... from grave to gay was happily managed. Blue-beard's wife afforded much diversion, and lost all sympathy the moment she was represented as a curious, tattling, timid, ridiculous woman. The terrors of Blue-beard himself subsided when he was properly introduced to the company; and the denouement of the piece was managed much to the entertainment of the audience; the catastrophe, instead of freezing their young blood, produced general laughter. Ludicrous images, thus presented to the mind which has been prepared for ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth
... of the denouement of the little comedy in real life for which he had provided the audience, the American ...
— The Silent Barrier • Louis Tracy
... rumors which spread, no one knows how, from one end of the ship to the other, two or three days before the official orders arrive, and which usually turn out tolerably correct. What will the last act of my little Japanese comedy be? the denouement, the separation? Will there be any touch of sadness on the part of my mousme, or on my own, just a tightening of the heartstrings at the moment of our final farewell? At this moment I can imagine nothing of the sort. And then the adieus of Yves and Chrysantheme, what will they be? This ...
— Madame Chrysantheme Complete • Pierre Loti
... who echoed her laugh, for, indeed, the story did sound like an absurd fable. All eyes were turned on Nell, and all waited for her to bring about with a denial the satisfactory denouement. Drake did not laugh, for his heart was burning with fury against the audacity, the shameless insolence, of Lady Luce; but he smiled in a grim fashion as his eyes ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice
... whole correspondence was on the table, and Mr. Holdfast laid it out in order, like a map, and went through it, taking notes. "What a comedy," said he. "All but the denouement. Now, Mr. Bayne, can any other manufacturers show me a correspondence ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... had that day written the final chapter, but he hadn't. The final chapter he was to write the next day, following hard upon a denouement, which to Mr. Tompkins, he with his own eyes having seen what he had seen, was so profound a puzzle that ever thereafter he mentally catalogued it under one of his favorite headlining phrases: "Deplorable Affair Shrouded ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... a romanticist, as all historians are, and he no doubt thought it would be a fine denouement to life's play to capture the daughter of his old sweetheart, and avenge himself on Fate and the unembarrassed Madame Necker and the unpiqued husband, all at one fell stroke—and she would not ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard
... incomplete in the Idylls, and by incompleteness we do not mean only that it is deprived of its denouement, of the climax up to which it has been working from the beginning, but that there is also to be noted the conspicuous absence of a refrain that should be there throughout. It is true that at the end of "Lancelot and Elaine," one single ...
— Studies from Court and Cloister • J.M. Stone
... the persons who examined the thing seriously, there remained in people's minds a suspicion, which time alone could disperse: this depended on what might happen to the Marquis de Precy, who was threatened that he should be slain in the first engagement; thus every one regarded his fate as the denouement of the piece; but he soon confirmed everything they had doubted the truth of, for as soon as he recovered from his illness he would go to the combat of St. Antoine, although his father and mother, who were afraid of the prophecy, said all they could to prevent him; he was killed ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... this in silence for a moment, then the sheriff voiced a feeling which, to a slight extent, had been lurking in the background of my own consciousness, in spite of my relief at the denouement. ...
— The Four Pools Mystery • Jean Webster
... picturesque veteran in horticulture, who has been an attendant at our meetings now for so many years, adding such a strong interest to our annual gatherings. Mr. Harrison recited at our late meeting the incident referred to here—without the denouement, which came to him in California this winter, where he met Mr. Lindbergh, one of Minnesota congressmen. As a result of this incident we had Mr. Harrison with again at our ...
— Trees, Fruits and Flowers of Minnesota, 1916 • Various
... greater gravity, a purpose which stood nearer to his heart, than the motive which I have just given; and of that purpose the reader will learn if only he will have the patience to read this prefatory narrative (which, lengthy though it be, may yet develop and expand in proportion as we approach the denouement with which the present work is ...
— Dead Souls • Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol
... eyes, watching the denouement. He stepped back, and waited to see what would be said to Cecil, who, so far, had ...
— Plotting in Pirate Seas • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... typhoid fever, with its regular bedchamber scenery, its properties of phials and pill-boxes, its little company of stock actors, its gradual evolution of a very simple plot, its familiar incidents, its emotional alternations, and its denouement, sometimes tragic, oftener happy. ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... all the stars glittered with her eagerness for the denouement. "And did she think it was ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... episodes, and an assured return to the original statement. The prevailing character being thus defined, the story readily unfolds, aided by related keys, in a slow movement and perhaps a minuet or scherzo, and gains its denouement in a stirring finale, written in the original key. Each movement has its own subjects, its individual development, with harmony of plan and idea ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore
... been so carefully concealed. With the astonishment of this rediscovery, there flashed across him again the fatefulness of the inspiration which had decided him not to go in the coach. His presence there would have no doubt warned the stranger, and so estopped this convincing denouement. It was quite possible that her companion, by relays of horses and the advantage of bridle cut-offs, could have easily followed the Three Pine coach and joined her at Stockton. But for what purpose? The lady's trunk, ...
— In a Hollow of the Hills • Bret Harte
... defer a denouement that will rejoice them all? Dorothy loves me—loves me for myself, and for nothing but myself. Who could have offered deeper proof of it? She has come to me in the face of her mother, in the face of poverty; she is willing to abandon everything to become ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... expression. "Lord Jim" is perhaps his masterpiece and may be regarded as the most interesting book written recently in our language with the exception of Henry James' "Golden Bowl." For sheer excitement and the thrilling sensation of delayed denouement it must be conceded that not one of our classical novelists can touch Conrad. "Victory" remains an absorbing evidence of his power of concentrating at one and the same moment our dramatic and our ...
— One Hundred Best Books • John Cowper Powys
... her remarks centred around a lover of her sister, who had just died at the age of seventy, and Titi considered that the denouement made by Manu, the sister, was uncalled for at the death bed, since the true and faithful wife stood there surrounded by nine children, all safely born the right side of the sheet. She did mention that the removal ...
— When Winter Comes to Main Street • Grant Martin Overton
... shook in his hand—Baraja commended his soul to all the saints in the Spanish calendar—Cuchillo clutched his carbine, as if he would crush it between his fingers—while the chief himself coolly awaited the denouement of the drama. ...
— Wood Rangers - The Trappers of Sonora • Mayne Reid
... impossible de donner a cette affaire le cachet d'une simple affaire de famille; l'attitude prise a Paris sur cette affaire de mariage des le commencement etait une fort etrange; il fallait toute la discretion de Lord Aberdeen pour qu'elle n'amenat un eclat plutot; mais ce denouement, si contraire a la parole du Roi, qu'il m'a donnee lors de cette derniere visite a Eu spontanement, en ajoutant a la complication, pour la premiere fois, celle du projet de mariage de Montpensier, aura mauvaise ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria
... hour censured, as they were certain to censure, the construction, and especially the conclusion, of "Rob Roy." No doubt the critics were right. In both Scott and Shakspeare there is often seen a perfect disregard of the denouement. Any moderately intelligent person can remark on the huddled-up ends and hasty marriages in many of Shakspeare's comedies; Moliere has been charged with the same offence; and, if blame there be, Scott is almost always to blame. Thackeray is little better. There must be some reason that ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... his hands together enthusiastically, "I, for one, want to be 'in at the death' on this, for it will simply be the finest piece of work, the grandest denouement, of any case that has ever come within my twenty years ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour
... wooing. Katy continued to hesitate. One day he asked her out to dine and she felt that a denouement was in the air. While they are on their way, with Katy in her best muslin, you must take as an entr'acte a brief ...
— The Voice of the City • O. Henry
... that he was an impostor: that Ruth believed him to be one Howard Spurlock, when he was only masquerading as Spurlock. If ever the denouement came—if ever the Hand reached him—Ruth would then understand why he had rebuffed all her tender advances. The law would accord her all her previous rights: she would return to the exact status out of which in his madness ...
— The Ragged Edge • Harold MacGrath
... so well known to the student of English history that I fear its repetition will lack that zest which attends the development of an unforeseen denouement. But it is of so great interest, and is so full, in its sweet, fierce manifestation, of the one thing insoluble by time, Love, that I will nevertheless rewrite it from old Sir Edwin's memoir. Not so much as an historical narrative, although I fear a little history will creep in, ...
— When Knighthood Was in Flower • Charles Major
... certainly by very far the finest who ever wrote "words for music." The first scene prepares us to understand clearly and to grasp firmly the forces that are presently to be let loose and run the drama on to its tragic denouement; and after that, scene follows ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... long since taken their departure. None of the factories and workshops had opened their doors; trade and commerce there was none; there was no employment for labor; the life of enforced idleness went on amid the alarmed expectancy of the frightful denouement that everyone felt could not be far away. And the people depended for their daily bread on the pay of the National Guards, that dole of thirty sous that was paid from the millions extorted from the Bank ...
— The Downfall • Emile Zola
... occurred, from the budget I have just read. I fear the tragedy was a squalid one. Madame, the victim, was elderly, unattractive in person, exacting in temper, and the owner of considerable wealth—at least, this is what came out at the trial. It was one of those tangles in which a fatal denouement is inevitable; and, if this had not come through Mademoiselle Sidonie, it would have come through somebody else. The lovers plotted to remove madame by first drugging her, then breaking her skull with the wood chopper, and then pitching her downstairs so as to produce the impression ...
— The Cook's Decameron: A Study in Taste: - Containing Over Two Hundred Recipes For Italian Dishes • Mrs. W. G. Waters
... means of the display advertisement; another, like Triumphant Democracy, was best served by sending out to the newspapers a "broadside" of pungent extracts; public curiosity in a novel like The Lady, or the Tiger? was, of course, whetted by the publication of literary notes as to the real denouement the author had in mind in writing the story. Whenever Mr. Stockton came into the office Bok pumped him dry as to his experiences with the story, such as when, at a dinner party, his hostess served an ice-cream lady and a tiger to the author, ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok
... break-up of the Honnetes Gens. De Pean, while resolving to make Le Gardeur the tool of his wickedness, did not dare to take him into his confidence. He had to be kept in absolute ignorance of the part he was to play in the bloody tragedy until the moment of its denouement arrived. Meantime he must be plied with drink, maddened with jealousy, made desperate with losses, and at war with himself and all the world, and then the whole fury of his rage should, by the artful contrivance of De Pean, be turned, ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... for the purpose of accelerating this denouement, had contrived, by buying up all the corn and sending it out of the country, to reduce the populace to famine, and then to make it appear that the King and Queen had been the monopolisers, and the extravagance of Marie Antoinette and her largesses ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XV. and XVI., Volume 6 • Madame du Hausset, and of an Unknown English Girl and the Princess Lamballe
... afraid; and the lover was more afraid; it was the erring wife who cut the best figure. But who could have foreseen this denouement? ...
— Possessed • Cleveland Moffett
... Neither is it clear why he held aloof from me, who am his superior in practically the same service. There we are, from the commencement, confronted with a very singular happening, but scarcely so singular as the denouement. Wolff vanished from your house that night ...
— The Great Impersonation • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... was approaching its climactic denouement; the rapturous moment of the younger brother's revealing was at hand; Judah, the older brother, was now holding the centre of the stage and making that thrilling appeal, than which nothing more moving is to be found in our English speech. ...
— The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land • Ralph Connor
... recital the young man's mind, stimulated by the eerie perplexities and the unhappy denouement, had ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder
... now that the pair began to muse on the denouement. Could this be a member of the firm or an employe? This hypothesis jeopardized the success of the night's adventure, unless, when they had permitted the prisoner to emerge, they bound and gagged ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 30, June 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... will be that the gentleman with the diabolical theory and the evidently strong will-power (as evidenced in the denouement at Mrs. Marshall's) produced the diabolical effects consciously or unconsciously. I do not think the former was the case; and if it is possible to get such results unconsciously, that phenomenon is quite as curious as the spiritualistic ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies
... preeminent, and accented "e"s in debris and denouement, and in some French words. These have been replaced with ...
— Birds and Poets • John Burroughs
... obeying his instructions, Admiral Tseng had conveyed a warning to his proposed victim, the consequence being that the unfortunate admiral was himself brutally murdered on the streets of Shanghai by revolver-shots for betraying the confidence of his master. After this denouement it was not very strange that General Feng Kuo-chang should have intimated to the Republican Party that as soon as they entered the Yangtsze Valley he would throw in his lot with them together with all his ...
— The Fight For The Republic in China • Bertram Lenox Putnam Weale
... more than that. Carried along on the boisterous rush of the narrative by Chesterton's wonderful high-spirited style, he will soon see that he is being carried into much deeper waters than he had planned on; and the totally unforeseeable denouement will prove for the modern reader, as it has for thousands of others since 1908 when the book was first published, an inevitable and moving experience, as the investigators finally discover who ...
— The Man Who Was Thursday - A Nightmare • G. K. Chesterton
... England" (and a capital printer he certainly is); and it was not "found that they produced impressions never before approached even by Delatre"—here we have the contradiction alluded to—no! this theatrical denouement I must also put aside ...
— The Gentle Art of Making Enemies • James McNeill Whistler
... objects of the Nihilists. The story is so vivid and true to life that it might easily be considered a history of political intrigue in Russia, disguised as a novel, while its startling incidents and strange denouement would only confirm the old adage that "truth is stranger than fiction," and that great historical events may be traced to apparently insignificant causes. The hero of the story is a young Englishman, whose startling resemblance to the Czar is taken advantage of by the Nihilists ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... it was not quite clear that he would wish the relation to be anything more than platonic comradeship in the service of their common ideal. An unsuccessful strike, bringing want and danger from the police, together with increasing jealousy on the part of the Anarchist, led up to the tragic denouement. I was not quite definite as to how this was brought about. All violent action was performed off the stage, and this made the plot at times difficult to follow. But it seemed that the Anarchist in a jealous rage forged a letter from his brother to bring Sonia to a rendezvous, ...
— The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism • Bertrand Russell
... David H. Whittier, possesses a tragical plot whose interest is slightly marred by triteness and improbable situations. Of the latter we must point out the strained coincidence whereby four distinct things, proceeding from entirely unrelated causes, give rise to the final denouement. The culmination of the aged father's resolve to kill his enemy, the conditions which make possible the return of the son, the presence of the enemy's hat and coat under the wayside tree, and the storm which prompts the son to don these garments, are all independent ...
— Writings in the United Amateur, 1915-1922 • Howard Phillips Lovecraft
... Parthenia his wife. I imagined a different denouement from the play. Ingomar had taken Parthenia back to the mountains, and kept a hotel for the benefit of the Alemanni, who resorted there in large numbers. Poor Parthenia was pretty well fagged out, and did all the work without "help." She had two "young barbarians," ...
— Legends and Tales • Bret Harte
... any further zoological fact were needed to verify the denouement of "The Pipe," it might be the general statement that lizards are abnormal brutes anyhow. Consider the chameleons of unsettled hue. And what is one to think of an animal which, when captured by the tail, is able to make its escape by willfully ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... effort to pacify him, made light of the affair; he told him that this man's absence did not matter much, as the first and second bassoonists were present, a line of argument that served to include the Prince in Beethoven's wrath. Hofsekretaer Mahler relates the denouement of the incident. On the way home, after the rehearsal, as he and Beethoven came in sight of the Lobkowitz Platz, Beethoven, with the delinquent third bassoonist still in his mind, could not resist crossing the Platz, and shouting into the great gateway of the palace, ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... you," he said. "It is probable that you will be put to some inconvenience. I can only regret that this—denouement did not come some months ago. You are likely to suffer more than I, because I do not care what the world thinks of me. Therefore you may tell the world what you choose about me—that I drink, that I gamble, that I am lacking in—honour! Anything ...
— With Edged Tools • Henry Seton Merriman
... insisted that she and Kate should stop with her during the remainder of her stay in the city. As Frank soon appeared and joined his entreaties with those of his mother, Fanny said she would do just as Mrs. Miller thought proper. Kate, who had expected a similar denouement, expressed her perfect willingness ...
— Tempest and Sunshine • Mary J. Holmes
... "shockers," he had a large and increasing public who were fascinated by the wholesome and thrilling stories he wrote, and who held on breathlessly to the skein of mystery until they came to the denouement he had planned. ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... where it was all leading to, or what it was leading up to as a final denouement, but he was inured to the taking of desperate chances. Peril was a pastime to him. He was ever watchful ...
— Cad Metti, The Female Detective Strategist - Dudie Dunne Again in the Field • Harlan Page Halsey
... very improbable events, fit only for the amusement of children, and not capable of raising one single passion, but that of contempt for the taste of those who could express an admiration of such a composition. The denouement of the piece is materially assisted by means of a dog: but this part of the story is told, and not exhibited; the Chinese taste not being quite so depraved, in this instance, as to admit the performance of a four-footed animal ...
— Travels in China, Containing Descriptions, Observations, and Comparisons, Made and Collected in the Course of a Short Residence at the Imperial Palace of Yuen-Min-Yuen, and on a Subsequent Journey thr • John Barrow
... for us," and Shakspeare became his favorite model. A grand tragedy based on the themes of Hamlet and King Lear was immediately undertaken, and although in its progress he killed off forty-two of the dramatis personae and was compelled in the denouement, for want of characters to let their ghosts reappear, we can not but regard it as a proof of the superabundance ...
— Life of Wagner - Biographies of Musicians • Louis Nohl
... Then ensued the frightful denouement. It ensued almost without warning. At the time I felt absolutely positive that I was seasick. I would have sworn to it. If somebody had put a Bible on my chest and held it there I would cheerfully have laid my right hand on it and taken a solemn oath that I was seasick. ...
— Europe Revised • Irvin S. Cobb
... who had no thought at all for that which they regarded as a comedy. Others again, like the men in the box, watched every move, every shade of expression which passed across the face of the Jewish proprietor. None knew for certain. But all guessed. And the guess of everybody was of a denouement which would serve the city with a topic of interest ...
— The Triumph of John Kars - A Story of the Yukon • Ridgwell Cullum
... been a poodle. She knew how to call his same in a way that was anything less than a public scandal. On this occasion everybody looked at him and then went silent, as people awaiting the startling denouement of a drama. " Rufus! " She was baring his shoulder to show the fieur-de-lis of ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... believing the mystery to be near its solution, [Footnote: This was, as nearly as I remember, in the autumn of 1879, the year following the robbery] entered into a conspiracy to forestall it and deliberately invented the lines of the coming denouement. Day by day they published its progress "upon the authority of a high official" who never existed, announcing that "behind each one of the grave-robbers stood a detective with uplifted hand" ready to arrest him when the word was given. It was truly the dawn of yellow ...
— The Making of an American • Jacob A. Riis
... to write you the denouement, I do, of course; though the delay is longer than I expected when promising. It was most exciting. Peter Walsh upset the Tortoise—on purpose I now think—but no one else has said so yet—and Lord Torrington swam for his life while his lovely ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... here. I heard from Lang. Ferrier prayeth to be remembered; he means to write, likes his Tourgenieff greatly. Also likes my 'What was on the Slate,' which, under a new title, yet unfound, and with a new and, on the whole, kindly DENOUEMENT, is going to shoot up and become a star. ...
— The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson - Volume 1 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... the passions: More of Enoch's morality: Turl improves, yet is still unaccountable and almost profane: Consecrated things: Themistocles and vengeance: A love scene: More marriage plots: And a tragi-comic denouement: The fate of Themistocles: The ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... it till you have turned the last page."—Cleveland Leader. "Its very audacity of motive, of execution, of solution, almost takes one's breath away. The boldness of its denouement is sublime."—Boston Transcript. "The literary hit of a generation. The best of it is the story deserves all its success. A masterly story."—St. Louis Dispatch. "The story is ingeniously told, ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... reader through having its separate incidents developed in some sort of organic unity. The handling of incidents for a definite effect gives what we call plot. A plot should work steadily forward to the end or denouement, and should yet conceal that end in order that interest may be maintained to the close. Evidently a writer who from the first has in mind the outcome of his story will subordinate the separate incidents to that main purpose and so in that controlling motive give unity to the whole plot. ...
— The Writing of the Short Story • Lewis Worthington Smith
... around these central figures, are mostly Italians or Americans. The great question to be solved is: Who is Merlina? In supplying the solution, the author takes occasion to introduce us to an obscure but interesting class of people. The denouement of "A Daughter of St. Peter's" is somewhat startling, but we must not impair the reader's pleasure by anticipation. We see from the advanced sheets that it is dedicated to the Canadian public, to whom we cordially commend ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... father had not expected it. They were, however, greatly pleased. In their discussion, which lasted far into the night, Captain Elkanah expressed the opinion that the unexpected denouement was the result of his interview with Eben. He had told the old Come-Outer what would happen to his ward if she persisted in her impudent and audacious plot to entrap a Regular clergyman. She, being ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... Longfellow may know it far better than I, who am no Norse scholar. But, if he does, might I beg him to translate it some day, as none but he can translate? It is so sad, that no tenderness less exquisite than his can prevent its being painful; and, at least in its denouement, so naive, that no purity less exquisite than his can prevent its being dreadful. But the Rime is as worthy of Mr. Longfellow as he is ...
— Lectures Delivered in America in 1874 • Charles Kingsley
... progress into a half-romantic interest, had enchanted the skilled novelist. She was well into the second volume of her small romance before she left, being as far as her observation then had taken her; but in a few days exciting incidents were expected, the denouement could not be far off, and Dickens was to have it when they met again. Yet it was to something far other than this amusing little fancy his thoughts had carried him, when he wrote of no one being capable to finish what she might have begun. In greater things ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... was somewhat late in appearing, and she employed the interval in meditating on the plot of her next novel, which was already partly sketched out, but for which she had been unable to find a satisfactory denouement. By a not uncommon process of ratiocination, Mrs. Fetherel's success had convinced her of her vocation. She was sure now that it was her duty to lay bare the secret plague-spots of society, and she was resolved that there should be no doubt as to the purpose of her ...
— The Descent of Man and Other Stories • Edith Wharton
... pleasure you feel arises from your conscious anticipation of the end, and your satisfaction in seeing that you anticipated correctly? Or part, sometimes, from the occasional unexpectedness of the real denouement? Well, life is like that. I enjoy observing my successes, and, in a way, my failures. Let me show you what I mean. I think I know what you said to Sebastian—not the words, of course, but the purport; and I will write it down now for you. Set down YOUR version, too. ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... central office, he stopped to send Ormsby a second telegram, reporting progress and asking him to be present in person at the denouement to put the facts on the wire at the earliest possible instant of time. "Everything depends upon this," he added, when he had made the message otherwise emphatic. "If we miss the ...
— The Grafters • Francis Lynde
... but it doesn't matter." An incongruous sanity warned him to avoid confessions, so he contented himself by rolling the situation over on his tongue, tasting the jealousy of his wife, the drama of the denouement, and remaining peacefully smiling ...
— Erik Dorn • Ben Hecht
... himself. His former tutor, who ought to have felt bound to drag him away from so ignoble a mode of life, rather strove to immerse him in degrading pleasures, so as to keep him out of business matters; without suspecting it, he was hurrying on the denouement of the terrible drama that was being acted behind the scenes at Castel Nuovo. Robert's widow, Dona Sancha of Aragon, the good and sainted lady whom our readers may possibly have forgotten, as her ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - JOAN OF NAPLES—1343-1382 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... thought it incumbent upon him to pull a face of desperate length whenever the subject was touched, in his innermost soul he had hardly ever enjoyed so delightful a joke as this denouement to his brother's marriage and to his cousin's engagement. And, strange to say, though he would most gravely protest against any interpretation of his kinswoman's disappearance save the one which must most redound ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... for the temporary entombing of thirty-six jelly tumblers, which would have been thirty-seven had Delia known the efficacy of a silver spoon. I can recall vividly the mental shift from the confession to that domestic excursion, my own impatience, Maggie's grim determination, and the curious denouement of that visit. ...
— The Confession • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... was a short one. I had not seen the beginning of it, but I soon witnessed the denouement. As I turned, the trapper had forced his adversary against the parapet, and with his long, muscular arm was bending him over its edge. In the other hand, uplifted, ...
— The Scalp Hunters • Mayne Reid
... place where Ethel was. Now, you know, all this time I was doomed to inaction. But at this juncture I strolled carelessly along, pretending not to see any thing in particular; and so, taking up an easy attitude, I waited for the denouement. It was a terrible position too. That child-angel! I would have laid down my life for her, but I had to stand idle, and see her rush to fling her life away. And all because I had not happened to have the mere formality ...
— The American Baron • James De Mille
... not as the judge judges but as the sun failing round helpless thing, As he sees the farthest he has the most faith, His thoughts are the hymns of the praise of things, In the dispute on God and eternity he is silent, He sees eternity less like a play with a prologue and denouement, He sees eternity in men and women, he does not see men and women ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman
... meaning, was in her gaze now. Something of vital moment to her own life was taking place out there so near, and she must see. A fleeting wonder as to whether her own companion was likewise watching came to her, but she did not turn to discover. The denouement, inevitable as death, was approaching, might come if she for an instant ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... conflagration was a signal that summoned them from afar. Like enough the sight was not new to them—it was not the first time they had witnessed the burning of a ship and had been present at the spectacle; before now they had assisted at the denouement, and were ever after ready to welcome such a catastrophe, and hasten towards ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... marvelling Silvas, who watched him as they would have watched a curiosity in a side-show. All about the carriage were gathered the children from a dozen blocks, waiting and eager for some tragic and terrible denouement. Carriages were seen on their street only for weddings and funerals. Here was neither marriage nor death: therefore, it was something transcending experience and ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... to dissuade the faction from attempting to assassinate the King, before being reduced to a minor role in the closing scene where he only has five short speeches and plays no significant part in the denouement. The character then, is something of a patchwork affair, playing different roles as the play progresses before being ...
— The Noble Spanish Soldier • Thomas Dekker
... for the Prince, forced either to overhear or interrupt the foregoing conversation, had fortunately chosen the former alternative. And here, perchance, should the story end, for the after-history of Joachim Murat is a tragical addendum to that happy denouement. ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... in the pursuit of literature. The piece was to have made part of a book which, however, has never been published, and which was to have been entitled: "My Examinations." It was given to me by the Registrar himself, some time after the astonishing denouement to this case, and ...
— The Mystery of the Yellow Room • Gaston Leroux
... miles, that tragic story absorbed me, banishing all other reflections. That was surely the strangest of histories!—and the drama had by no means reached its denouement. Between the first and last acts "an interval of ten years is supposed to pass." There was the stage direction! Darke was still alive, active, dangerous, bent on mischief. He had an able coadjutress in his female ally. That singular woman, with whom his life was so closely ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... the author has displayed great adroitness in the "denouement" of his tale. In the course of a few pages all the principal characters, male and female, are suddenly produced, safe and unscathed, before the reader. To be sure, this is done by the aid of a little "diablerie," but then it is done very neatly,—much more so than in some of the clumsy ...
— Bagh O Bahar, Or Tales of the Four Darweshes • Mir Amman of Dihli
... in the neighborhood; Master Hauchecorne was informed of it. He started out again at once, and began to tell his story, now made complete by the denouement. He ...
— Short-Stories • Various
... personality. They have no knowledge of anything beyond the customs and superstitions of the simple folk about them. Their religion, which is so continually before us, furnishing the very mainspring of the fatal denouement, is of the most superficial sort, if it can be called religion at all. Whether you are bitten by a dog, a wolf, or a snake, or lose your eyesight, or are in danger of losing your lover, you run to the shrine ...
— Frederic Mistral - Poet and Leader in Provence • Charles Alfred Downer
... ourselves warranted in adding whatever may be necessary to making it perfectly clear, or in withholding circumstances that did not bear upon our narrative. With this proviso, we now proceed to detail the denouement. ...
— The Black Prophet: A Tale Of Irish Famine • William Carleton
... disdain for the eccentricities of modern fashion, and put herself into the hands of the best dressmaker in town. And thus snubbing, and being snubbed, dressing and dancing and feasting and flirting, did she soar higher and higher in her butterfly career. The denouement comes when they are cut out by "Ye rising Minnows"—an American sculptor—one Pygmalion F. Minnow—whose wife was twice ...
— George Du Maurier, the Satirist of the Victorians • T. Martin Wood
... the other told him, "I understand, and I'd gladly take another beating like this one to escape this wretched denouement." ...
— Flowing Gold • Rex Beach
... this singular psychological combat might have lasted before a nerve quivered somewhere and brought the denouement of a double death, there is no telling. For accident (or fate) intervened to pluck these antagonists back into life and rob the gloating Pierre of the happiness of seeing two men perish without danger to himself. Something of uncertain shape, but of a blue color, loomed vaguely behind ...
— The Cruise of the Jasper B. • Don Marquis
... The denouement is soon told:—Warner, having received his daughter and her husband, gives a party at which Lady, and afterwards Lord Norwold, are present. Here Warner's anxiety to obtain the bracelet is explained. He reminds his lordship that he once accused his elder brother of stealing that ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... groaned Mr. Winslow; "now you're going to see and hear the dramatic denouement, while I shall have to be content with taking ...
— Dick the Bank Boy - Or, A Missing Fortune • Frank V. Webster
... reason to regret I had not chosen a more fitting reason for my denouement, in which case I might perhaps have turned it to greater profit than I appeared likely to do. With the morning, she had recovered all her coolness and self-possession, and had evidently determined ...
— Laura Middleton; Her Brother and her Lover • Anonymous
... Jane and me took of her, giving up our time and experience to her, she never so much as made Jane a single present." Popular opinion, which regarded Mrs. Stiver's attention as purely speculative, was not shocked at this unprofitable denouement; but when Peg refused to give anything to clear the mortgage off the new Presbyterian Church, and even declined to take shares in the Union Ditch, considered by many as an equally sacred and safe investment, she began to lose favor. ...
— The Twins of Table Mountain and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... for his carcass. His notions of honor appear to be much the same with those of his jovial contemporary Falstaff, as conveyed in his memorable soliloquy. In the sublime night-piece which ends with the fulling-mills—truly sublime until we reach the denouement—Sancho asks his master: "Why need you go about this adventure? It is main dark, and there is never a living soul sees us; we have nothing to do but to sheer off and get out of harm's way. Who is there ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... Gloversville, cannot possibly be put into a paragraph, at any rate the kind of paragraph that Will Howe (who used to be a professor of English) would approve. On the whole, rather than rewrite the entire narrative, tersely, we will have to postpone the denouement (of the story, not the tie) until to-morrow. This is an exhibition of the difficulty of telling anything exactly. There are so many subsidiary considerations that beg for explanation. Please be patient, Pete, and to-morrow we will explain that ...
— Plum Pudding - Of Divers Ingredients, Discreetly Blended & Seasoned • Christopher Morley
... limited canvas as it were, all the features which were at once the conditions and the characteristics of a great epoch of civilization, and to give them form and movement by setting the history of some of the men then living before the reader, with its complications and its denouement. All the personages of my story grew up in my imagination from a study of the times in which they lived, but when once I saw them clearly in outline they soon stood before my mind in a more distinct form, like people in a dream; ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... he won all our money." Here Bob flung up his head, poked out his lips like a bugle, and broke into a grotesque, "Hoo! hoo! hoo!" It was such an absurd laugh, and Bob's tale had come to such an absurd denouement, that the white men roared, and shuffled their feet on the flared base of the stove. Some spat in or near a box filled with sawdust, and betrayed other nervous signs of satisfaction. When a man so spat, he stopped laughing abruptly, straightened his face, and stared ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... the princess had the depth of a precipice, the grace of a queen, the corruption of diplomatists, the mystery of a first initiation, and the dangerous qualities of a siren. The two clever men of the world, incapable of foreseeing the denouement of their joke, succeeded in presenting Diane d'Uxelles as a consummate specimen of the Parisian woman, the cleverest of coquettes, the most enchanting mistress in the world. Right or wrong, the woman whom they thus treated so lightly was sacred to d'Arthez; ...
— The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan • Honore de Balzac
... the glance which she bestowed upon Shirley. From the angle of an audience, he was beginning to observe a phase of this double play of personalities which was unseen by either of the participants. Two sleepless nights, after such a first evening together, and what then? He imagined the denouement, with a growing enjoyment of his ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... premature, for Miss Trix's fascinations, which were indubitably great, began to have their effect. The scene about the canoe was re-enacted, but with a different denouement. This time the promise was forgotten, and the widow forsaken. Then Mrs. Wentworth put on her armor. We had, in fact, reached this very absurd situation that these two ladies were contending for the favors of, or the domination over, such an obscure, poverty-stricken, hopelessly ineligible ...
— Comedies of Courtship • Anthony Hope
... look at her, and found, startled, that she too was looking at him. There, at opposite ends of the long corridor, father and daughter stood interrogatively at gaze, each feeling a little guilty, each wondering what, at the denouement, the other would say. Then the charming Charlotte blew him a kiss from her hand, and his Majesty did likewise; and, off to the fulfilment of her destiny went the Princess; and off to his fulfilment of her destiny went he; each quite sure in their two different ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... omega; extreme, extremity; gable end, butt end, fag-end; tip, nib, point; tail &c. (rear) 235; verge &c. (edge) 231; tag, peroration; bonne bouche[Fr]; bottom dollar, tail end, rear guard. consummation, denouement; finish &c. (completion) 729; fate; doom, doomsday; crack of doom, day of Judgment, dies irae, fall of the curtain; goal, destination; limit, determination; expiration, expiry[obs3], extinction, extermination; death &c. 360; end of all ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... afterwards quite knew how the crowd in the church broke up and dispersed itself after this denouement. For a few minutes the crush of people round the pulpit was terrific; all eyes were fixed on the young black-browed peasant who had so nearly been a parricide,—and on the father who publicly exonerated him,—and then there came a pressing towards the doors which was excessively ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... care to distract his breast. What an affectionate, self-sacrificing sister would she be, thus kindly to relieve her brother at her own expense! But, just as this plan began to ripen for execution, she was counter-plotted, or fancied herself to be, which led to the same denouement. Winnie Morris came to pass a vacation with her brother, Wayland, and the fore-doomed bachelor, Augustus Lester, most audaciously dared to fall in love with the cackling girl. So Miss Mary declared; and ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton
... inscrutable regard of the Sepoy, who, despite the embarrassing denouement, managed to maintain a fair degree of composure, Gratz, addressing the man who had ...
— The Flaw in the Sapphire • Charles M. Snyder
... at mystification are immensely entertaining; but are there to be many more of them, before you can permit our little comedy to reach its happy denouement?" ...
— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland
... Sing Sing, or even sooner, some gray-haired figure will appear at the State Capitol, and knock tremblingly at the door of the Executive, asking for a pardon or a rehearing of the case, and claiming to be the only original, genuine William R. Hubert—such a denouement would not be beyond the realms of possibility, but more likely the request will come in the form of a petition, duly attested and authenticated before some notary in the West, protesting against Browne's conviction and incarceration, and bearing the flowing signature of William ...
— True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office • Arthur Train
... with peculiar pathos tells of Portia's death by her own hand. In all the great tragedies, with the notable exception of Othello, when the forces of the resolution, or falling action, are gathering towards the denouement, Shakespeare introduces a scene which appeals to an emotion different from any of those excited elsewhere in the play. "As a rule this new emotion is pathetic; and the pathos is not terrible or lacerating, but, even if painful, ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare
... this denouement, and that laugh is eloquent proof that in saying there can be no real love without absolute monopolism of one heart by another I simply formulated and emphasized a truth which we all feel instinctively. ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... my skill in laying out work; but as I had no brother to come for me, I usually went home before the evening frolic, which consisted of plays. Male and female partners went through the common quadrille figures, keeping time to the music of their own voices, and making a denouement every few moments by some man kissing some woman, perhaps in a dark hall, or some woman kissing some man, or some man kissing all the women, or vice versa. Elders and preachers often looked on in pious approbation, ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... accident brought his undertaking to the knowledge of his father and mother before it was completed. He always had a boyish regret that his little plot had been betrayed before the moment for the denouement arrived. The book was written in Latin and dedicated to Cuvier.* (* "Selecta genera et species piscium quos collegit et pingendos curavit Dr. J.W. de Spix". Digessit, descripsit et observationibus ...
— Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence • Louis Agassiz
... simultaneous—a coherent series of representations may take place, involving what seem to be protracted periods for their unfoldment. Every reader will easily call to mind dream experiences of this character, in which the long-delayed denouement was suggested and prepared for by some extraneous sense-impression, showing that the entire dream drama unfolded within the time it took that impression to travel from ...
— Four-Dimensional Vistas • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... in this wise. Mr. Child had been admitted to the bar and had opened an office in Boston. One evening about nine o'clock he rode out to Watertown on horseback and called at the Curtises' where Miss Francis then was. "My mother, who believed the denouement had come," says Mr. Curtis, "retired to her chamber. Mr. Child pressed his suit earnestly. Ten o'clock came, then eleven, then twelve. The horse grew impatient and Mr. Child went out once or twice to pacify him, and returned. At last, just as the clock was striking ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach
... of any insusceptibility of the material to such uses. I still think that the story, as above given, might easily and successfully be dramatized, giving it a mixed character—that of the melo-dramatic opera, and only softening the close to a less tragical denouement.] ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... The denouement I cannot relate, as the artful bird, followed by her ardent suitor, soon flew away beyond my sight. It may not be rash to conclude, however, that she held out ...
— Wake-Robin • John Burroughs
... beyond his hopes. The coming of Van Dorn and the acquaintance formed with Lindlay would be of untold value to him in his work. A little later, Van Dorn would come to his assistance without arousing suspicion, not being known as a mining expert, and when the time came for the final denouement, Lindlay would accompany Mr. Cameron to the mines, as he was a skilled expert, and having already visited the mines, could furnish testimony as to the fraud practiced ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... dresses which were worn both by Lord Chetwynde and herself, and the general appearance of the grounds. On these she lingered long, describing little incidents in her search, as though unwilling to come to the denouement. When she reached this point of her story she became deeply agitated, and as she described the memorable events of that meeting with the fearful figure of the dead the horror that filled her soul was manifest in her looks and in her words, and communicated itself to Gualtier ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille
... toujours fort grave et plein de perils. Je ne puis naturellement faire dans une pareille situation de projets a longue echeance. Non seulement tout plan de voyage est abandonne pour le moment, mais je vis au jour le jour, toujours pret a partir au recu d'une depeche annoncant le denouement fatal. Aussi ne puis-je dans ce moment insister pour vous engager a faire au Chateau d'Eu cette visite dont je me promettais tant de plaisir et d'interet, mais qui, dans les circonstances actuelles, risquerait fort d'etre brusquement ...
— Memoirs of the Life and Correspondence of Henry Reeve, C.B., D.C.L. - In Two Volumes. VOL. II. • John Knox Laughton
... abundant tide of his flowing and leisurely utterances, he would have more time to bestow on really exciting and dramatic episodes, instead of going off into a little corner and carefully embellishing it, while the denouement waits and the interest grows cold. Neither can he write a page without sending a sly bolt of amused perception through it, in which he discovers some foible or pricks some bubble of pretension, but always ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... Colette in accordance with her promise to Amarilly summoned John to council. It was not easy to bridge the distance which had been steadily increasing with the months that had rolled by since the surplice denouement, and Colette, formerly supreme in her sway, was perceptibly timid in making the advance. After writing and tearing up several notes she called him up by telephone and asked him in a consciously casual tone if ...
— Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley • Belle K. Maniates
... out like a figure of Christ imperfectly gilded and fixed upon a cross of tarnished silver. The flickering rays shed by the blue flames of a crackling fire were therefore the sole light of this sombre chamber, where the denouement of a drama was just ending. A log suddenly rolled from the fire onto the floor, as if presaging some catastrophe. At the sound of it the sick woman quickly rose to a sitting posture. She opened two eyes, clear as those of a cat, and ...
— Analytical Studies • Honore de Balzac |
