It is the fragrant lack of practicality that makes high-heeled shoes so fascinating: in terms of static mechanics they induce a so...rt of insecurity which some find titillating. If a woman wears a high-heeled shoe it changes the apparent musculature of the leg so that you get an effect of twanging sinew, of tension needing to be released. Her bottom sticks out like an offering. At the same time, the lofty perch is an expression of vulnerability, she is effectively hobbled and unable to escape. There is something arousing about this declaration that she is prepared to sacrifice function for form.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Any translation which intends to perform a transmitting function cannot transmit anything but information--hence, something inesse...ntial. This is the hallmark of bad translations.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Of all the inhabitants of the inferno, none but Lucifer knows that hell is hell, and the secret function of purgatory is to make o...f heaven an effective reality.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 »
Common-sense is part of the home-made ideology of those who have been deprived of fundamental learning, of those who have been kep...t ignorant. This ideology is compounded from different sources: items that have survived from religion, items of empirical knowledge, items of protective scepticism, items culled for comfort from the superficial learning that is supplied. But the point is that common- sense can never teach itself, can never advance beyond its own limits, for as soon as the lack of fundamental learning has been made good, all items become questionable and the whole function of common-sense is destroyed. Common-sense can only exist as a category insofar as it can be distinguished from the spirit of enquiry, from philosophy.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The reader uses his eyes as well as or instead of his ears and is in every way encouraged to take a more abstract view of the lang...uage he sees. The written or printed sentence lends itself to structural analysis as the spoken does not because the reader's eye can play back and forth over the words, giving him time to divide the sentence into visually appreciated parts and to reflect on the grammatical function.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The art of never making a mistake is crucial to motherhood. To be effective and to gain the respect she needs to function, a mothe...r must have her children believe she has never engaged in sex, never made a bad decision, never caused her own mother a moment's anxiety, and was never a child.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
It is known that Whistler when asked how long it took him to paint one of his "nocturnes" answered: "All of my life." With the sam...e rigor he could have said that all of the centuries that preceded the moment when he painted were necessary. From that correct application of the law of causality it follows that the slightest event presupposes the inconceivable universe and, conversely, that the universe needs even the slightest of events.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The information links are like nerves that pervade and help to animate the human organism. The sensors and monitors are analogous ...to the human senses that put us in touch with the world. Data bases correspond to memory; the information processors perform the function of human reasoning and comprehension. Once the postmodern infrastructure is reasonably integrated, it will greatly exceed human intelligence in reach, acuity, capacity, and precision.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »