Crude thoughts and fierce forces are my state. I do not know who I am. Nor what I was. I cannot hear a sound. Pain is near that will be like no pain felt before.
Norman MailerRead
Part of the oncoming demise (of New York during its terrible fiscal crisis) is that none of us can simply believe it. We were always the best and the strongest of cities, and our people were vital to the teeth. Knock them down eight times and they would get up with that look in the eye which suggests the fight has barely begun.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects resilience and the indomitable spirit of New Yorkers during tough times.
Norman Mailer's quote emphasizes the unwavering strength and resilience of New Yorkers in the face of adversity. He suggests that even in moments of despair, such as the city's fiscal crisis, the people maintain a fighting spirit and an unyielding attitude, indicative of their identity as a strong community that refuses to be defeated.
Themes
ResilienceStrengthAdversityNew YorkSpirit
In practice
Example use cases
This quote could be used in a motivational speech about perseverance in tough economic times.
More from Norman Mailer
All quotes →I no longer gave a sick dog's drop for the wisdom, the reliability and the authority of the public's literary mind, those creeps and old ladies of vested reviewing.
Norman MailerRead
There's nothing glorious about being a professional. . . . Professionalism probably comes down to being able to work on a bad day.
Norman MailerRead
The natural role of twentieth-century man is anxiety.
Norman MailerRead
Over-certified adjectives are the mark of most best-seller writing
Norman MailerRead
At bottom, I mean profoundly at bottom, the FBI has nothing to do with Communism, it has nothing to do with catching criminals, it has nothing to do with the Mafia, the syndicate, it has nothing to do with trust-busting, it has nothing to do with interstate commerce, it has nothing to do with anything but serving as a church for the mediocre. A high church for the true mediocre.
Norman MailerRead
Similar quotes
At the age when other children, I imagine, experience their first 'feeling' for a person, or for art, or for religion, I was affectionate, good, and even pious: by that I mean that under the influence of my mother, I was devoted to the Child Jesus.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
O sun, to tell thee how I hate thy beams That bring to my remembrance from what state I fell, how glorious once above thy sphere.
John MiltonRead
Footballers' 'lack of loyalty,' for instance, is not an indication of players' moral delinquency. Instead, the capacity to move on quickly without forming lasting attachments is a skill that the contemporary capitalist world inculcates and relies upon.
Mark FisherRead
I believe that all is illusion and vanity outside the treasure of truths slowly accumulated, and which will never again be lost. I believe that the sum of these truths, always increasing, will at last confer on man incalculable power and peace, if not happiness. Yes, I believe in the final triumph of life.
Emile ZolaRead
Over-commercialization and its resulting restrictions and limitations can be very damaging and distorting to the inherent nature of the individual. I did not deliberately abandon my fans, nor did I deliberately abandon any responsibilities.
Lauryn HillRead
Whatever men expect, they soon come to think they have a right to; the sense of disappointment can, with very little skill on our part, be turned into a sense of injury. (senior devil speaking)
C. S. LewisRead