Love Consists In Leaving The Loved One

The Pleasures Of Mental Agility Are Much Overstated, Inevitably - As It Now Appears To Me - By Those Not Exclusively Dependent Upon Them.

There Is Nothing To Be Said For Being Crippled. You Don't See The World Better Or Clearer, Nor Do You Develop Some Special Set Of Skills By Way Of Compensation.

The Different American Experience Of The 20th Century Is Crucial Because The Lesson Of The Century For Europe, Which Essentially Is That The Human Condition Is Tragic, Led It To Have A Build A Welfare System And A Set Of Laws And Social Arrangements That Are More Prophylactic Than Idealistic. It's Not About Building Perfect Futures; It's About Preventing Terrible Pasts. I Think That Is Something That Europeans In The Second Half Of The 20th Century Knew In Their Bones And Americans Never Did, And It's One Of The Big Differences Between The Two Western Cultures.

The 60s Were A Continuation Of The 50s Much More Than People Realized. Certainly In Some Countries, Like Britain, There Was Still A Culture Of Deference, Whereas In The 70s We Really Are In A Time Of Angry Transition. The Generation That Came Into Young Adulthood In The 70s Couldn't Find Jobs; That Wasn't True In My Generation. They Entered A Time When Two Depressing Things Hit Them Both At The Same Time.

Reality Is A Powerful Solvent.