definition:
a noun(such as courage or freedom)that names an idea,event,quality, or concept. that contrast with concrete noun.
example and observation
- "love is an irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired."(Robert Frost)
- "Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties."
(Erich Fromm) - "Men say they love independence in a woman, but they don't waste a second demolishing it brick by brick."
(Candice Bergen) - "When love is gone, there's always justice.
And when justice is gone, there's always force.
And when force is gone, there's always Mom.
Hi, Mom!"
(Laurie Anderson) - "More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly."
(Woody Allen, "My Speech to the Graduates") - "Abstract and concrete are usually defined together or in terms of each other. The abstract is that which exists only in our minds, that which we cannot know through our senses. It includes qualities, relationships, conditions, ideas, theories, states of being, fields of inquiry and the like. We cannot know a quality such as consistency directly through our senses; we can only see or hear about people acting in ways that we come to label consistent."
(William Vande Kopple, Clear and Coherent Prose. Scott, Foresman, 1989) - "Although abstract nouns tend to be uncountable (courage, happiness, news, tennis, training), many are countable (an hour, a joke, a quantity). Others can be both, often with shifts of meaning from general to particular (great kindness/many kindnesses)."
(Tom McArthur, "Abstract and Concrete." The Oxford Companion to the English Language, 1992) - "I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy--but that could change."
(Dan Quayle)
