Soldiers found reassurance in ritualized activity rather than actual danger

Evidence

too dead a calm was ominous, but this night watch officially established them in an inoffensive war: it was reassuring. — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 194

Categorization

• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 194
• XREF: connects to: Being bypassed by a distant battle can produce a false sense of security — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 421; Soldiers can experience wartime as sheltered idyll rather than danger — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 47; A sense of safety in wartime is fragile and self-consciously temporary — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 50 (+5 more)

Library Connections

• A soldier’s aiming reverie through a gun-sight becomes an absorbing, trance-like experience #exemplifies (0.80) — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 61

Broader Connections

• Total sensory emptiness can feel worse than the danger of battle itself #corroborates (0.75) — Julien Gracq, Balcony in the Forest, 442
• Perceived safety, including from nature, physiologically switches off chronic stress responses #expands (0.70) — Harriet A. Washington, A Terrible Thing to Waste, 1226