The writer is the person who stands outside society, independent of affiliation and independent of influence.
Don DelilloRead
Look at those numbers running. Money makes time. It used to be the other way around. Clock time accelerated the rise of capitalism. People stopped thinking about eternity. They began to concentrate on hours, measurable hours,man-hours, using labor more efficiently.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects on the relationship between time and money in the context of capitalism.
Don Delillo's quote examines how the rise of capitalism transformed society's perception of time from a spiritual or eternal concept to a measurable commodity. As money became a dominant force, time was increasingly viewed in terms of efficiency and productivity, leading to a narrowed focus on immediate gains rather than longer-term meaning or existential reflections.
Themes
TimeMoneyCapitalismEfficiencyLabor
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion on the impact of capitalism during a seminar.
More from Don Delillo
All quotes →War is the form nostalgia takes when men are hard-pressed to say something good about their country.
Don DelilloRead
American writers ought to stand and live in the margins, and be more dangerous.
Don DelilloRead
For me, writing is a concentrated form of thinking.
Don DelilloRead
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.
Don DelilloRead
[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.
Don DelilloRead
Similar quotes
It was the contemplation of God that created men who were equal, for it was in God that they were equal.
Antoine De Saint-ExuperyRead
The true perfection of man lies not in what man has, but in what man is.
Oscar WildeRead
Where is the Life we lost in living?
T. S. EliotRead
Truth, which is simple and one, admits of no variety.
Pope Leo IRead
It is part of the formidableness of a genuine mass movement that the self-sacrifice it promotes includes also a sacrifice of some of the moral sense, which cramps and restrains our nature.
Eric HofferRead
The Tao belongs neither to knowing nor not knowing. Knowing is false understanding; not knowing is blind ignorance. If you really understand the Tao beyond doubt, it's like the empty sky. Why drag in right and wrong?
Alan WattsRead