It is one of the unexpected disasters of the modern age that our new unparalleled access to information has come at the price of our capacity to concentrate on anything much. The deep, immersive thinking which produced many of civilization's most imp...
When Sartre says man has been thrown into the world, he is alone, there is no God, we are responsible for what we are, what we do, I say yes!" The affirmative echoed around the woods. The dog pricked up his ears. This man has no one to talk to, thoug...
Beauty is frightening," they will tell you — Lazily you will arrange A Spanish shawl on your shoulders, A red rose in your hair. "Beauty is simple," they will tell you — Clumsily with a motley shawl You will cover a child up, A red rose on the fl...
The universe and the events in it are thus perfect examples to imitate. However, no matter how perfect the example is, everyone will draw and interpret objects according to their abilities. Charles Lako, commenting on aesthetics once said, that the m...
I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and d...
In her eyes was the reflection of everything that mattered: old diners with neon signs, vinyl records, celluloid film, drive-in movies, Pears soap, department stores, her brother’s old blue Camaro car and the smell of coal dust in the rainy sky of ...
In my freshman and sophomore years of college, I read dozens of books by the great thinkers of Western civilization. From Plato to Nietzsche, Homer to Shakespeare - you name it, I read it. At times it drove me crazy - picture reading hundreds of page...
Inconstancy of every second punishes me. The wind, the rain, the clouds, the days, I try to grasp the hours but they banish me, And I remain in the vortex of incongruity. The lone coyote shrieks, Startling my soul into wakefulness. The Cacti bloom an...
I can’t help but think that if she was going to kill herself, she might as well have done it earlier. Perhaps when I was a toddler. Or better yet, an infant. It certainly would have made my life easier. I asked my uncle Hugh (who is not really my u...
It's a very cheery thing to come into London by any of these lines which run high and allow you to look down upon the houses like this." I thought he was joking, for the view was sordid enough, but he soon explained himself. "Look at those big, isola...
Thus, on the one hand, Spenser's thought is steeped in sensuous detail, so that for him there is no really abstract thinking; men, he thinks, 'should be satisfied with the use of these days, seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing es...
The most interesting inconsistency in thought is connected with the Bower of Bliss. This passage--the twelfth canto of the second Book--is probably the best known in the whole poem and the most frequently cited as an example of Spenser's sensuous bea...
On my fifth trip to France I limited myself to the words and phrases that people actually use. From the dog owners I learned "Lie down," "Shut up," and "Who shit on this carpet?" The couple across the road taught me to ask questions correctly, and th...
As reason returned to me, memory came with it, and I saw that even on the worst days, when I thought I was utterly and completely miserable, I was nevertheless, and nearly all the time, extremely happy. That gave me something to think about. The disc...
He had in those days imagined himself capable of extraordinary heroisms and endurances which would make the girl he loved forget the awkward hands and the spotty chin of adolescence. Everything had seemed possible. One could laugh at daydreams, but s...
I think this is when most people give up on their stories. They come out of college wanting to change the world, wanting to get married, wanting to have kids and change the way people buy office supplies. But they get into the middle and discover it ...
In order to align your life choices with your values, you will need to inquire about the effects of your actions (and inactions) on yourself and others. Although we are always stumbling upon new knowledge that shifts our choices and life direction, b...
You're the only one I've ever been able to open up to like this. See, there you go. Another sign. And damn it, I don't believe in signs like this, but they all point to you. I wish I'd opened up a lot more to you in the past, but I never wanted to bo...
So I asked Dr Ceric if he thought there was a conflict between European values and Islam. ‘Not at all,’ he said. ‘Respect for other religions lies at the heart of Islam. And the principle of democracy is even anchored in Islam.’ When I looked...
I'm sorry," I heard him say again. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a sudden blur of movement as he slid out of his seat, left some bills for the breakfast he wouldn't eat, and walked away. And as he did, I thought again of those mornings in ...
So Sonia was not my only or even my first best friend. She was the last. It wasn t that I hadn t made friends since just that I thought myself past the age of that particular kind of friendship. Adult friendship doesn t grant you an exclusive isn t m...
