coalsmoke

See also: coal-smoke

English

Noun

coalsmoke (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of coal-smoke.
   • 1988, A[rthur] Bryson Gerrard, “Scotland”, in Butterflies & Coalsmoke, Oxford: Susan Abrahams, →ISBN, pages 108–109:

     During the long wait in the station another smell assailed our nostrils; a compound of coalsmoke, fish, oranges and other fruit and vegetables. […] Out in the village there was a new smell: peatsmoke, a much more romantic smell than coalsmoke – the railway was now far away.

   • 1990, Robert Pinsky, “Skies of the City: A Poetry Reading”, in Gene W[illiam] Ruoff, editor, The Romantics and Us: Essays on Literature and Culture, New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, →ISBN, pages 175–176:

     The sunrise of Hopkins—with “brown brink” suggesting a cloud of industrial smoke—presents the streaks and colors of the sun, seen through the air full of coalsmoke, as an image of the Holy Ghost.

   • 2015, Phyll MacDonald-Ross with I. D. Roberts, Bandaging the Blitz, 1938-42, London: Sphere, →ISBN, page 270:

     On my return, I stopped and pulled down the window. A blast of icy air laced with coalsmoke hit me in the face.

   • 2017, Sarah Moss, “London, summer 1878”, in Signs for Lost Children, New York, N.Y.: Europa Editions, →ISBN, page 16:

     They are city-dwellers, men whose lives pass in the shadows of buildings, whose lungs are silted with coalsmoke, and few will ever cross the sea.