DAPHNE DU MAURIER
Rebecca
I should remember the rose garden in summer, and the birds that sang at dawn. Tea under the chestnut tree, and the murmur of the sea coming up to us from the lawns below…they were memories that cannot hurt.
EMIL CIORAN
In every man sleeps a prophet, and when he wakes there is a little more evil in the world.
MARJANE SATRAPI
If I have one message to give to the secular American people, it’s that the world is not divided into countries. The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don’t know each other, but we talk together and we understand each other perfectly.
The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.
ANNE CARSON
"My Religion"
My religion makes no sense
and does not help me
therefore I pursue it.
When we see
how simple it would have been
we will thrash ourselves.
I had a vision
of all the people in the world
who are searching for God
massed in a room
on one side
of a partition
that looks
from the other side
(God’s side)
transparent
but we are blind.
Our gestures are blind.
Our blind gestures continue
for some time until finally
from somewhere
on the other side of the partition there we are
looking back at them.
It is far too late.
We see how brokenly
how warily
how ill
our blind gestures
parodied
what God really wanted
(some simple thing)
The thought of it
(this simple thing)
is like a creature
let loose in a room
and battering
to get out.
It batters my soul
with its rifle butt.
GUY DEBORD
Society of the Spectacle
Although fascism rallies to the defense of the main points of bourgeois ideology which has become conservative (the family, property, the moral order, the nation), reuniting the petty-bourgeoisie and the unemployed routed by crisis or deceived by the impotence of socialist revolution, it is not itself fundamentally ideological.
It presents itself as it is: a violent resurrection of myth which demands participation in a community defined by archaic pseudo-values: race, blood, the leader.
Fascism is technically-equipped archaism. Its decomposed ersatz of myth is revived in the spectacular context of the most modern means of conditioning and illusion. Thus it is one of the factors in the formation of the modern spectacle, and its role in destruction... makes it one of the fundamental forces of present-day society.
BERTRAND RUSSELL
First they fascinate the fools, then they muzzle the intelligent.
ALBERT CAMUS
Be careful. When a democracy is sick, fascism comes to its bedside, but it is not to inquire about its health.
JEAN-LÉON GÉROME
The Lie said to the Truth-
"Let's take a bath together,
the well water is very nice.
The Truth, still suspicious,
tested the water and found out
it really was nice.
So they got naked and bathed.
But suddenly, the Lie leapt out of the water
and fled, wearing the clothes of the Truth.
The Truth, furious, climbed out of the well
to get her clothes back.
But the World, upon seeing the naked Truth,
looked away, with anger and contempt.
Poor Truth returned to the well and disappeared
forever, hiding her shame.
Since then, the Lie runs around the world,
dressed as the Truth, and society is very happy.
Because the world has no desire to know
the naked Truth.
GEORGE SELDES
Fact and Fascism
The truth is not in the commercial media because the truth is a dagger pointed at its heart, which is its pocketbook.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Human, All Too Human
It is easy to give the recipe for what the masses call a great man. By all means, supply them with something that they find very pleasant, or, first, put the idea into their heads that this or that would be very pleasant, and then give it to them. But on no account immediately: let it rather be won with great exertion, or let it seem so. The masses must have the impression that a mighty, indeed invincible, strength of will is present; at least it must be seen to be there. Everyone admires a strong will, because no one has it, and everyone tells himself that, if he had it, there would be no more limits for him and his egoism.
Now, if it appears that this strong will is producing something very unpleasant for the masses, instead of listening to its own covetous desires, then everyone admires it all the more, and congratulates himself. For the rest, let him have all the characteristics of the masses: the less they are ashamed before him, the more popular he is. So, let him be violent, envious, exploitative, scheming, fawning, groveling, puffed up, or, according to the circumstances, all of the above.
FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT
The first truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism - ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. Among us today a concentration of private power without equal in history is growing.
ERNEST HEMMINGWAY
For Whom the Bells Toll
“Are you a communist?"
"No I am an anti-fascist"
"For a long time?"
"Since I have understood fascism.”