harken
Pronunciation
  • (RP) IPA: /ˈhɑːk(ə)n/
  • (GA) IPA: /ˈhɑɹkən/
Verb

harken (harkens, present participle harkening; past and past participle harkened)

  1. (ambitransitive, chiefly, US) Alternative spelling of hearken: to hear, to listen, to have regard#Noun|regard.
    • 1697, “The Fourth Book of the {{w”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: Printed for Jacob Tonson, […], OCLC 403869432 ↗, lines 690–693, page 143 ↗:
      Ev'n from the depths of Hell the Damn'd advance, / Th' Infernal Manſions nodding ſeem to dance; / The gaping three-mouth'd Dog forgets to ſnarl, / The Furies harken, and their Snakes uncurl.
    • 1942, William Faulkner, “The Bear”, in Go Down, Moses, New York, N.Y.: Random House, OCLC 749227801 ↗, section 5, page 326 ↗:
      [T]he mother who had shaped him if any had toward the man he almost was, [...] whom he had revered and harkened to and loved and lost and grieved: [...]
  2. (intransitive, US, figuratively) To hark back, to return#Verb|return or revert (to a subject#Noun|subject, etc.), to allude to, to evoke, to long#Verb|long or pine#Verb|pine for (a past event or era).
    • 2005, Carol Padden; Tom L. Humphries, Inside Deaf Culture, page 48:
      Bell argued that the manual approach was "backwards," and harkened to a primitive age where humans used gesture and pantomime.



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