emanations from without

Question

and for that matter I am probably occupying the very room that any number of exalted and somewise memorable characters sat in, some of them on hot, breathless afternoons, lonely and private and full of their own sense of emanations from without

Please tell me the meaning of the red text. I'm completely confused.

Many thanks!

Clive · Accepted Answer

Hi,

and for that matter I am probably occupying the very room that any number of exalted and somewise memorable characters sat in, some of them on hot, breathless afternoons, lonely and private and full of their own sense of emanations from without

Please tell me the meaning of the red text. I'm completely confused.

'Something emanates from something' means 'something originates or comes from something'.

Literally, you could say 'a bad smell emanated from the sewer'.

Figuratively, you could say 'nervousness emanated from him as he sat in the interview room'.

'Without' means 'outside'. It's hard to know in your paragraph whether it means from outside the room or outside the characters.

Your paragraph needs a bit more context to allow me to understand it well. It seems to mean that these characters were sitting, at various times, thinking about the feelings they were receiving from other people.

Best wishes, Clive

Mfholic · Answer

No air moves in or out of the room, yet I am curiously affected by emanations from the immediate surroundings. I am twenty-two blocks from where Rudolph Valentino lay in state, eight blocks from where Nathan Hale was executed, ... , (I could continue this list indefinitely); and for that matter I am probably occupying the very room that any number of exalted and somewise memorable characters sat in, some of them on hot, breathless afternoons, lonely and private and full of their own sense of emanations from without

Clive, here's more context.

Thanks again for your help!

Milky · Answer

http://www.nt.armstrong.edu/EBWHEREISNY.htm

Milky · Answer

Look earlier in the text:

New York is the concentrate of art and commerce and sport and religion and entertainment and finance, bringing to a single compact arena the gladiator, the evangelist, the promoter, the actor, the trader, and the merchant. It carries on its lapel the unexpungeable odor of the long past, so that no matter where you sit in New York you feel the vibrations of great times and tall deeds, of queer people and events and undertakings.

The text is saying that emanations (here, the perception of historical acts)) "great times and talls deeds" are everywhere in NY. Even famous people such as Valentino would have experienced such emanations. He would have considered such history and been affected or impressed by it.

Mfholic · Answer

My rewriting of this paragraph:

and because of the fact that I could continue this list indefinitely I am probably occupying the very room in which some respectable and to some extent memorable characters sat. Some of them sat in this room on hot, breathless afternoons, lonely and private and they sensed the emanations from outside the room in their own way.

Milky · Answer

Try writing without using the word "emanations".

Mfholic · Answer

How about 'emission':)

Mfholic · Answer

Since I have been sitting in this miasmic air shaft, a good many rather splashy events have occurred in town.

Question:

How can someone sit in an air shaft?

Milky · Answer

Or just "they sensed the history around them".

BarbaraPA · Answer

This is a difficult passage, and milky has expressed exactly what the author (who is, by the way, the same White of Strunk & White, as well as the author of Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little) is trying to say. So much history has happened in New York that the sense of it gets in to whatever place you are in. You don't have to have a breeze blowing your way to "smell" (not literally) the history, and each person will be aware of the events of the past in his or her own way.

emanations from without

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