Famous quotes containing the words history of, history, modern, greece, transition and/or democracy:
“There is no history of how bad became better.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“... in a history of spiritual rupture, a social compact built on fantasy and collective secrets, poetry becomes more necessary than ever: it keeps the underground aquifers flowing; it is the liquid voice that can wear through stone.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“The experience of the gangster as an experience of art is universal to Americans. There is almost nothing we understand better or react to more readily or with quicker intelligence.... In ways that we do not easily or willingly define, the gangster speaks for us, expressing that part of the American psyche which rejects the qualities and the demands of modern life, which rejects “Americanism” itself.”
—Robert Warshow (1917–1955)
“All that grave weight of America
Cancelled! Like Greece and Rome.
The future in ruins!”
—Louis Simpson (b. 1923)
“Some of the taverns on this road, which were particularly dirty, were plainly in a transition state from the camp to the house.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“As for piracy, I love to be pirated. It is the greatest compliment an author can have. The wholesale piracy of Democracy was the single real triumph of my life. Anyone may steal what he likes from me.”
—Henry Brooks Adams (1838–1918)