Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Adam Gopnik

Quote by Adam Gopnik

“The relentless note of incipient hysteria, the invitation to panic, the ungrounded scenarios - the overwhelming and underlying desire for something truly terrible to happen so that you could have something really hot to talk about - was still startling. We call disasters unimaginable, but all we do is imagine such things. [...] That, you could conclude mordantly, is the real soundtrack of our time: the amplification of the self-evident toward the creation of paralyzing, preëmptive paranoia.”

Quote by Adam Gopnik

Author

Adam Gopnik
Adam Gopnik

Adam Gopnik is a renowned Canadian writer whose essays and articles on culture, literature, and politics have made a significant impact on public discourse. Born on August 24, 1956, Gopnik has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 1986, contributing thought-provoking insights into the complexities of modern life. His work, characterized by its wit and emotional depth, has earned him a place among the most influential writers of his generation. more

You May Also Like

“My parents were kind of over protective people. Me and my sister had to play in the backyard all the time. They bought us bikes for Christmas but wouldn't let us ride in the street, we had to ride in the backyard. Another Christmas, my dad got me a basketball hoop and put it in the middle of the lawn! You can't dribble on grass.”

“When my sons arrived in the family, their legal status was not ambiguous at all. They were our kids. But their wants and affections were still atrophied by a year in the orphanage. They didn't know that flies on their faces were bad. They didn't know that a strange man feeding them their first scary gulps of solid food wasn't a torturer. Life in the cribs alone must have seemed to them like freedom. That's what I was missing about the biblical doctrine of adoption. Sure it's glorious in the long run. But it sure seems like hell in the short run.”