The writer is the person who stands outside society, independent of affiliation and independent of influence.
Don DelilloRead
The future is always a wholeness, a sameness. We're all tall and happy there,' she said. 'This is why the future fails. It always fails. It can never be the cruel happy place we want to make it.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the idealization of the future and the inherent disappointment in reality.
Don DeLillo's quote suggests that the future is often perceived as a utopian state, where everyone is content and at peace. However, he argues that this vision fails to materialize because it is rooted in unrealistic expectations, leading to a disconnect between our desires for a perfect future and the complexities of actual life.
In practice
This quote can be shared during a discussion on the challenges of achieving happiness in life.
The writer is the person who stands outside society, independent of affiliation and independent of influence.
War is the form nostalgia takes when men are hard-pressed to say something good about their country.
American writers ought to stand and live in the margins, and be more dangerous.
For me, writing is a concentrated form of thinking.
I used to think it was possible for an artist to alter the inner life of the culture. Now bomb-makers and gunmen have taken that territory.
[I]n the American soul there is a lonely individual standing in a vast landscape. He is either on a horse or driving a car, depending, and either way he’s carrying a gun. This is one of the essential images in American mythology.
How can you thank a man for giving you what's already yours? How then can you thank him for giving you only part of what's already yours?
Lest we forget at least an over the shoulder acknowledgment to the very first radical: from all our legends, mythology and history (and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins - or which is which), the very first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom - Lucifer.
If I could only remember that the days were not bricks to be laid row on row, to be built into a solid house, where one might dwell in safety and peace, but only food for the fires of the heart.
So, you are very welcome to our house. It must appear in other ways than words, Therefore, I scant this breathing courtesy.
You die, but most of what you have accumulated will not be lost; you are leaving a message in a bottle.
What is human warfare but just this; an effort to make the laws of God and nature take sides with one party.
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