Void If Detached: Choices
06.14.2021
3 quotes from 3 books. Sent weekly.
Enjoy!
—Mark
“Own only what you can always carry with you: know languages, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag.”
—The Gulag Archipelago, 1918-1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1973)
“The word ‘decision’ comes from the Latin word caedere, which means ‘to cut.’ When we decide to pursue one thing, we necessarily cut away another. If there's no cutting, we haven't made any decision at all.“
—Wanting: The Power of Mimetic Desire in Everyday Life, by Luke Burgis (2021)
“I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig-tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.”
—The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath (1963)