Suddenly we have a baby who poops and cries, and we are trying to calm, clean up, and pin things together all at once. Then as fas...t as we learn to cope--so soon--it is hard to recall why diapers ever seemed so important. The frontiers change, and now perhaps we have a teenager we can't reach.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The function of the hero in art is to inspire the reader or spectator to continue in the same spirit from where he, the hero, leav...es off. He must release the spectator's potentiality, for potentiality is the historic force behind nobility. And to do this the hero must be typical of the characters and class who at that time only need to be made aware of their heroic potentiality in order to be able to make their society juster and nobler. Bourgeois culture is no longer capable of producing heroes. On the highbrow level it only produces characters who are embodied consolations for defeat, and on the lowbrow level it produces idols--stars, TV "personalities," pin-ups. The function of the idol is the exact opposite to that of the hero. The idol is self-sufficient; the hero never is. The idol is so superficially desirable, spectacular, witty, happy that he or she merely supplies a context for fantasy and therefore, instead of inspiring, lulls. The idol is based on the appearance of perfection; but never on the striving towards it.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Philosophers multiply our general nouns and verbs; they give fresh sense to stale terms; "man" and "nature" are their characters; ...while novelists toil at filling in the blanks in proper names and at creating other singular affairs. A novelist may pin a rose to its stem as you might paper a tail to its donkey, the rose may blush at his command, but the philosopher can elevate that reddening from an act of simple verbal predication to an angel-like ingression, ennobling it among Beings. The soul, we must remember is the philosopher's invention, as thrilling a creation as, for instance, Madame Bovary.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Among all the emotions, the rich have the least talent for love. It is possible to love one's dog, dress or duck-shooting hat, but... a human being presents a more difficult problem. The rich might wish to experience feelings of affection, but it is almost impossible to chip away the enamel of their narcissism. They take up all the space in all the mirrors in the house. Their children, who represent the most present and therefore the most annoying claim on their attention, usually receive the brunt of their irritation.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Maybe we were the blind mechanics of disaster, but you don't pin the guilt on the scientists that easily. You might as well pin it... on M motherhood.... Every man who ever worked on this thing told you what would happen. The scientists signed petition after petition, but nobody listened. There was a choice. It was build the bombs and use them, or risk that the United States and the Soviet Union and the rest of us would find some way to go on living.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
When her guests were awash with champagne and with gin, She was recklessly sober, as sharp as a pin.... An abstemious man would reel at her look, As she rolled a bright eye and praised his last book.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground And tell sad stories of the death of kings!... How some have been deposed, some slain in war, Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed, Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed-- All murdered; for within the hollow crown That rounds the mortal temples of a king Keeps Death his court, and there the antic sits, Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp, Allowing him a breath, a little scene, To monarchize, be feared, and kill with looks, Infusing him with self and vain conceit, As if this flesh which walls about our life Were brass impregnable; and humored thus, Comes at the last and with a little pin Bores through his castle wall, and--farewell, king!LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Now look, Winocki. There are two other men on this ship who washed up as pilots. But Martin's a bombardier and Hauser went in for ...navigation. And they're both good. You're a good gunner or you wouldn't have the rating you've got. We need you just like we need the whole gang. It takes all of us to make this ship function. Now get this into your head. We all belong to this airplane. Every man has got to rely on every other man to do the right thing at the right time. You played football, Winocki. You know how one man can gum up the works. You gotta play ball with us and play the game, or I'm gonna have to get rid of you.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
There was a faith-healer of Deal Who said, "Although pain isn't real,... If I sit on a pin And it punctures my skin, I dislike what I don't think I feel."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »