STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

What am I then? A dream?

STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

We take off into the cosmos, ready for anything: for solitude, for hardship, for exhaustion, death. Modesty forbids us to say so, but there are times when we think pretty well of ourselves. And yet, if we examine it more closely, our enthusiasm turns out to be all sham. We don't want to conquer the cosmos, we simply want to extend the boundaries of Earth to the frontiers of the cosmos….

We are humanitarian and chivalrous; we don't want to enslave other races, we simply want to bequeath them our values and take over their heritage in exchange. We think of ourselves as the Knights of the Holy Contact. This is another lie. We are only seeking Man. We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors.

A single world, our own, suffices us; but we can't accept it for what it is. We are searching for an ideal image of our own world: we go in quest of a planet, a civilization superior to our own but developed on the basis of a prototype of our primeval past.

HANIF KUREISHI
Intimacy

At the same time, you have to find the right distance between people. Too close, and they overwhelm you, too far and they abandon you. How to hold them in the right relation?

STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

We all know that we are material creatures, subject to the laws of physiology and physics, and not even the power of all our feelings combined can defeat those laws. All we can do is detest them. The age-old faith of lovers and poets in the power of love, stronger than death, that finis vitae sed non amoris, is a lie, useless and not even funny.

So must one be resigned to being a clock that measures the passage of time, now out of order, now repaired, and whose mechanism generates despair and love as soon as its maker sets it going? Are we to grow used to the idea that every man relives ancient torments, which are all the more profound because they grow comic with repetition? That human existence should repeat itself, well and good, but that it should repeat itself like a hackneyed tune, or a record a drunkard keeps playing as he feeds coins into the jukebox...

STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

The fate of a single man can be rich with significance, but the history of thousands and millions of men does not mean anything at all, in any adequate sense of the word.

SLAVOJ ŽIŽEK

Our thesis eleven today should be:

"Critical leftists have hitherto only dirtied with dust the balls of those in power – the point is to cut them off."

STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

A human being, appearances to the contrary, doesn’t create his own purposes. These are imposed by the time he’s born into; he may serve them, he may rebel against them, but the object of his service or rebellion comes from the outside. To experience complete freedom in seeking his purposes he would have to be alone, and that’s impossible, since a person who isn’t brought up among people cannot become a person.

STANISŁAW LEM
Solaris

If man had more of a sense of humor, things might have turned out differently.

JOHN WRAY

Only a blind man could have lived through these last years without seeing what was bearing down upon us; so I made myself blind as I could manage. I wanted to believe the worst was behind me, and I found an easy way to make it so. I simply turned my back on what was coming.

RAY BRADBURY
Fahrenheit 451

If you don't want a man unhappy politically, don't give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it. Peace, Montag. Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs or the names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. Cram them full of noncombustible data, chock them so damned full of 'facts' they feel stuffed, but absolutely 'brilliant' with information. Then they'll feel they're thinking, they'll get a sense of motion without moving. And they'll be happy, because facts of that sort don't change.

STEPHEN KING
The Dead Zone

Something in his heart seemed to have closed. It was not a major feeling. That was the worst of it—it wasn’t a major feeling at all.

SLAVOJ ŽIŽEK
Sex and the Failed Absolute

Trump's twisted 'greatness' is that he effectively acts - he is not afraid to break the unwritten (and written) rules to impose his decisions. As we learned (not only) from Hegel, our life is regulated by a thick web of written and unwritten rules, rules which teach us how to practice the explicit (written) rules. While Trump (more or less) sticks to explicit legal regulations, he tends to ignore the unwritten silent pacts which determine how we should practice these rules - the way he dealt with Kavanaugh was just one example of it.

Instead of just blaming Trump, the Left should learn from him and do the same. When a situation demands it, we should shamelessly do the impossible and break the unwritten rules. Unfortunately, today's Left is in advance terrified of any radical acts - even when it is in power, it worries all the time:'If we do this, how will the worlds react? Will our acts cause panic?' Ultimately, this fear means: 'Will our enemies be mad and react?' In order to act in politics, one has to overcome this fear and assume the risk, make a step into the unknown.

HANIF KUREISHI
Intimacy

I am aware how susceptible to illusion we all are. How disturbing it is that our illusions are often our most important beliefs.

TOVE DITLEVSEN
"Divorce 1"

He would
in case of divorce
lay claim to half
of everything
he said.
Half a sofa,
half a TV,
half a summerhouse
half a pound of butter
half a child.

The apartment was his
he said
because it was in his name.
The thing was
he loved her.

She loved another
whose wife would
lay claim to half
of everything.

So the marriage act stated.
As clearly as
two and two makes four.

The solicitor
said so too.

She broke half of everything
and ripped the tax bill apart.
Then she left for
the women’s shelter on Jagtvej
with half a child.

The child was teased at school
because he only had
one ear.
Other than that,
this life too
was bearable
since things couldn’t be
any different.

-

Translated from the Danish by Sophia Hersi Smith and Jennifer Russell

LI BAN
"Drinking Alone with the Moon"

A tankard of wine in the midst of some flowers
I drank alone, no one was with me
Raising my cup, asking the bright moon
Bring me my shadow let us be three.
Alas, the moon couldn’t drink,
And my shadow stared at my vacantly.
Still, for a while, I had these two friends,
To cheer me up as Spring was ending.
On the spot, I composed a poem, the moon encouraged me,
I got up and danced, my shadow stumbled along.
All along, we two bosom companions.
Finally drunk, it was then I lost him.
Eternally tied, lacking emotion, one wanders,
We two for a time watching the Starry River.

SLAVOJ ŽIŽEK

God was a lazy programmer.

WILLIAM STAFFORD

"Love the Butcher Bird Lurks Everywhere"

A gather of apricots fruit pickers left

gleam like reasons for light going higher, higher;

I look half as hard as I can to tease

the fruit out of its green.

        (It is time to run lest pity overtake us,

        and calamity pit invents to accompany itself:

        to sigh is a stern act—we are judged by this air.)

Down the steady eye of the charging bear

a gun barrel swerves—intention, then flame;

and willows do tricks to find an exact place in the wind:

resolution steady, bent to be true.

        (While there’s time

        I call to you by all these dubious guides:

        “Forsake all ways except the way we came.”)

TED GREENWALD
"Staring Doesn’t Help"

Staring doesn’t help
Nor does running around
Music doesn’t help
Especially songs
Getting together doesn’t help
Nor does staying apart
Seeing someone else doesn’t
Nor does seeing you
Sleeping doesn’t help
Nor does waking
Dreaming doesn’t help
Nor do any facts
Running doesn’t help
Nor does sitting around

JOYCE CAROL OATES

There is a wish in the heart of mankind to be distracted and confused. Truth is but one attraction, and not always the most powerful.

MARY OLIVER
Upstream

Through these woods I have walked thousands of times. For many years I felt more at home here than anywhere else, including our own house. Stepping out into the world, into the grass, onto the path, was always a kind of relief. I was not escaping anything. I was returning to the arena of delight.