The gangster's world is less open, and his arts not so easily identifiable as the Westerner's. Perhaps he too can keep his counten...ance, but the mask he wears is really no mask: its purpose is precisely to make evident the fact that he desperately wants to "get ahead" and will stop at nothing. Where the Westerner imposes himself by the appearance of unshakable control, the gangster's pre-eminence lies in the suggestion that he may at any moment lose control; his strength is not in being able to shoot faster or straighter than others, but in being more willing to shoot. "Do it first," say Scarface expounding his mode of operation, "and keep on doing it!" With the Westerner, it is a crucial point of honor not to "do it first"; his gun remains in his holster until the moment of combat.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Who wants to become a writer? And why? Because it's the answer to everything. To "Why am I here?" To uselessness. It's the streami...ng reason for living. To note, to pin down, to build up, to create, to be astonished at nothing, to cherish the oddities, to let nothing go down the drain, to make something, to make a great flower out of life, even if it's a cactus.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
To be a good actor ... it is necessary to have a firmly tempered soul, to be surprised at nothing, to resume each minute the labor...ious task that has barely just been finished.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Mediocre people have an answer for everything and are astonished at nothing. They always want to have the air of knowing better th...an you what you are going to tell them; when, in their turn, they begin to speak, they repeat to you with the greatest confidence, as if dealing with their own property, the things that they have heard you say yourself at some other place.... A capable and superior look is the natural accompaniment of this type of character.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The quality of imagination is to flow, and not to freeze. The poet did not stop at the color or the form, but read their meaning, ...neither may he rest in this meaning, but he makes the same objects exponents of his new thought. Here is the difference betwixt the poet and the mystic, that the last nails a symbol to one sense, which was a true sense for a moment, but soon become old and false. For all symbols are fluxional; all language is vehicular and transitive, and is good, as ferries and horses are, for conveyance, not as farms and houses are, for homestead. Mysticism consists in the mistake of an accidental and individual symbol for an universal one.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The poet alone knows astronomy, chemistry, vegetation, and animation, for he does not stop at these facts, but employs them as sig...ns. He knows why the plain, or meadow of space, was strewn with these flowers we call suns, and moons, and stars; why the great deep is adorned with animals, with men, and gods; for, in every word he speaks he rides on them as the horses of thought.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Kidd Dabb: The boat doesn't stop at Santa Maria this trip. Geoff Carter: Why not?... Kidd: They have no bananas. Geoff: They have no bananas? Kidd: Yes, they have no bananas.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Dance is bigger than the physical body. ...When you extend your arm, it doesn't stop at the end of your fingers, because you're da...ncing bigger than that; you're dancing spirit.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
In the East, it may be sufficiently symbolic to take an apartment three subway stops away from the family residence and proclaim i...ndependence. In the state of illusion and vast distances, establishing individuality may require leaving California. The young people of the East, rich and poor, are disciplined by the urban system in which they live. Trains have schedules. Buses stop at marked corners. Restaurants fill up at certain hours. Shops are open certain days, normally not on Sundays. California isn't like that. The young people of the West can almost shape their lives to suit, especially if they own a vehicle that can carry them anywhere at whim. California is home of the all-night market, Sunday shopping, and twenty-four-hour breakfasts in coffee shops. California is easy to rebel against because everything, including disaffection, is convenient. New York is not so easy.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »