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Quote by Keith Gessen

“You had to be fundamentally stupid, I sometimes thought, to become the sort of academic specialist that hiring committees liked. You had to be thick somehow. You had to block out all the other things in the world to focus on one narrow, particular thing.”

Quote by Keith Gessen

Book:A Terrible Country
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A Terrible Country

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Author

Keith Gessen
Keith Gessen

Keith Gessen is an American novelist born on January 9, 1975. His works often explore the relationship between individuals and society, as well as the impact of history on personal destinies. Gessen is known for his unique narrative style and in-depth exploration of complex themes. more

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“Handcrafted Humanity Sonnet 12 Here are some words born of narrowness, Activist, woke, religious, atheist, Socialist, communist, capitalist, conservative, Intellectual, intelligent, classy, elitist, Educated, learned, well-versed, sound-mind, Traditional, old-fashioned, spiritual, altruistic, Empiricist, Existentialist, rationalist, freethinker, Godly, compassionate, selfless and mystic. I refuse to be defined by any of them, None of them can explain my true sentiment. I may advocate for the good within each of them, But I refuse to give any of them exclusive endorsement. All these words are too puny to define my identity. My name is human, my heart contains entire humanity.”

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“A sense of humor is essentially a sense of perspective. It is an understanding that comes from a true sense of proportion. Humor is not a matter of laughing at things, but of understanding them. At its highest it is a part of understanding life. It is an ability to see ourselves as we are, and to smile at the comic figure that the biggest of us cuts in strutting across life's stage.”

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Book:Unprofitable servants: Conferences on humility
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“To know your mind, you need a little distance. You need to be a step or two away and be able to notice what your mind is doing without being so lost or involved in it that you can’t see it. It’s like trying to see your eyes. If you want to see yourself, you need to create some space, you need a mirror. Stillness, mindfulness, meditation: these are the mirrors.”

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“So sweet is this song that no one could resist it. For in it is all the passionate ache for the moonlight, and the great hunger of the sea, and the terror of desolate places,—all things that lure men to the unattainable. Omari tessala marax, tessala dodi phornepax amri radara poliax armana piliu amri radara piliu son; mari narya barbiton madara anaphax sarpedon andala hriliu Translation: I am the harlot that shaketh Death. This shaking giveth the Peace of Satiate Lust. Immortality jetteth from my skull, And music from my vulva. Immortality jetteth from my vulva also, For my Whoredom is a sweet scent like a seven-stringed instrument, Played unto God the Invisible, the all-ruler, That goeth along giving the shrill scream of orgasm. Every man that hath seen me forgetteth me never, and I appear oftentimes in the coals of the fire, and upon the smooth white skin of woman, and in the constancy of the waterfall, and in the emptiness of deserts and marshes, and upon great cliffs that look seaward; and in many strange places, where men seek me not. And many thousand times he beholdeth me not. And at last I smite myself into him as a vision smiteth into a stone, and whom I call must follow.”

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Book:The Vision and the Voice: With Commentary and Other Papers
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