The phrase "a certain bent" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a particular inclination, tendency, or preference that someone has towards something.
Example: "She has a certain bent for artistic expression, often creating beautiful paintings in her free time."
Alternatives: "a particular inclination" or "a specific tendency."
The Suffolk Legislature has a certain bent for banning things.
That is from "Mr Bleaney," composed by Philip Larkin in the year before Frank's stay in Butte, and, with its musings on a man who "lay on the fusty bed / Telling himself that this was home," it accords with the gloomy, monkish pleasure, as bitter as old marmalade, that Englishmen of a certain bent have always taken in the Spartan deficiencies of their land.
Photograph by Wayne Miller / Magnum That is from "Mr Bleaney," composed by Philip Larkin in the year before Frank's stay in Butte, and, with its musings on a man who "lay on the fusty bed / Telling himself that this was home," it accords with the gloomy, monkish pleasure, as bitter as old marmalade, that Englishmen of a certain bent have always taken in the Spartan deficiencies of their land.
One may for example reasonably suspect that the claim that the supposedly silly questions about platonic objects really all are silly will have appeal only for philosophers of a certain bent of mind.
And this license began to be exercised by national news organizations increasingly stocked by young reporters with more refined educations (and tastes) than the ink-stained wretches of previous years reporters who, influenced by crusades of the Sixties, were moralists of a certain bent, easily outraged by government lies and half-truths.
Unless you're of a certain bent and believe the above should be reversed.
For actors of a certain masculine bent, James Bond has long been viewed as a career pinnacle.
But critics from a certain political bent have found it unpalatable.
It also has a certain philosophical bent in which it discusses the meaning of life and death.
He had spent four years with the Air Force and there was a certain military bent to his parenting of Donnie Jr. and Simone, his 16-year-old son and 14-year-old daughter, his widow, Sarah, said.
There are, however, some differences in terminology, which show Porphyry to have a certain scholarly bent that Plotinus avoids, and Porphyry is in general more interested in reconciling Aristotle with Platonism than Plotinus was.
