Fashion is primitive in its insistence on exhibitionism, which withers in isolation. The catwalk fashion show with its incandescen...t hype is its apotheosis. A ritualized gathering of connoiseurs and the spoilt at a spotlit parade of snazzy pulchritude, it is an industrialized version of the pagan festivals of renewal. At the end of each seasonal display, a priesthood is enjoined to carry news of the omens to the masses.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Louise, something in me tightens when an American intellectual's eyes shine, and they start to talk to me about the Russian people.... Something in me says, Watch it, a new version of Irish Catholicism is being offered for your faith.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
During the fifties, for example, the American character appeared with some consistency that became a model of manhood adopted by m...any men: the Fifties male. He got to work early, labored responsibly, supported his wife and children and admired discipline. Reagan is a sort of mummified version of this dogged type. This sort of man didn't see women's souls well, but he appreciated their bodies; and his view of culture and America's part in it was boyish and optimistic. Many of his qualities were strong and positive, but underneath the charm and bluff there was, and there remains, much isolation, deprivation, and passivity. Unless he has an enemy, he isn't sure that he is alive. The Fifties man was supposed to like football, be aggressive, stick up for the United States, never cry, and always provide.... During the sixties, another sort of man appeared. The waste and violence of the Vietnam war made men question whether they knew what an adult male really was. If manhood meant Vietnam, did they want any part of it? Meanwhile, the feminist movement encouraged men to actually look at women, forcing them to become conscious of concerns and sufferings that the Fifties male labored to avoid.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A child is not a salmon mousse. A child is a temporarily disabled and stunted version of a larger person, whom you will someday kn...ow. Your job is to help them overcome the disabilities associated with their size and inexperience so that they get on with being that larger person.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I rarely read any Latin, Greek, German, Italian, sometimes not a French book, in the original, which I can procure in a good versi...on. I like to be beholden to the great metropolitan English speech, the sea which receives tributaries from every region under heaven. I should as soon think of swimming across Charles River when I wish to go to Boston, as of reading all my books in originals when I have them rendered for me in my mother tongue.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »