Just 3 Quotes - 02.17.2020
3 quotes from 3 books. Sent weekly.
Enjoy!
—Mark
“I have this sense (which came upon me when I was young and struggling, and hasn’t left yet) that certain verities (maybe these are especially American verities?) are false and harmful. So: There is no such thing as a ‘level playing field,’ genetics and karma being what they are, and to the extent that we pretend there is such a thing (by conflating wealth with virtue) we are playing a fool’s game, taking credit for that which was given to us (a good family, health, affluence, basic ability, intelligence, et cetera, et cetera) by fate.”
—George Saunders, in conversation with David Sedaris, from the paperback edition of Tenth of December
“You see it’s like this: the greatest adventure of man is science, the adventure of penetrating into matter, into the material universe. But the adventure is our property, a human property, and the best description of us is the humanities.”
—Robert Frost, from The Paris Review, The Art of Poetry, No. 2
“The more of the elements of that world which are stored away in that pattern-making machine, the mind, the more chances are increased for the production of new and striking combinations, or ideas. Advertising students who get restless about the ‘practical’ value of general college subjects might consider this.”
—A Technique for Producing Ideas, by James Webb Young