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Quote by Tariq Ali

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The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power

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Tariq Ali
Tariq Ali

Tariq Ali is a British writer born on October 21, 1943. His works span a variety of fields including history, politics, and literature, known for his incisive analysis and critical thinking. more

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“Die israelische Gesellschaft ist schon lange ein schillerndes Mosaik zwischen zwei Polen –Demokratie und Religion. Wie könnte es auch anders sein mit einem Volk voller Widersprüche: Säkulare, Traditionsbewusste, Religiöse, Modern-Orthodoxe, Ultraorthodoxe, Siedler. Und alles dazwischen. Mit den Palästinensern Israels. Mit Juden, Muslimen, Christen, Drusen, Baha’i … Viele dieser Gruppen haben ihren eigenen Lebensstil, spezielle Überzeugungen und kollidierende Vorstellungen von den wichtigsten Bereichen gesellschaftlichen Zusammenlebens. Von Ehe und Scheidung, Wehrpflicht, Geschlechtertrennung, Bildung, Toleranz für Minderheiten, Einstellung zu den Palästinensern und zur Zwei-Staaten-Lösung. Und so viel mehr. Dieses Mosaik aus Widersprüchen hält nur mit Kompromissen. Und einer Führung, die das Volk der Israelis mehr oder weniger zusammenbringt. Ansonsten kommt es zu gefährlichen Rissen. Wenn ich heute auf Israel blicke, sehe ich vor allem ein Land, das sich von innen zerreißt. Menschen, die mit ihren Wurzeln um sich schlagen, als seien sie Waffen.”

RootsIsraelIdentity PoliticsSocietal Rifts
Book:Kein anderes Land: Aufzeichnungen aus Israel
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“I have walked by stalls in the market-place where books, dog-eared and faded from their purple, have burst with a white hosanna. I have seen people crowned with a double crown, holding in either hand the crook and flail, the power and the glory. I have understood how the scar be­comes a star, I have felt the flake of fire fall, miraculous and pentecostal. My yesterdays walk with me. They keep step, they are grey faces that peer over my shoulder.”

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Book:Free Fall
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“There were no milestones in the Copper Country. Often a traveler could only measure the progress of a journey by the time it took to get from each spoiled or broken thing to the next: a half-day’s walk from a dry well to the muzzle of a cannon poking out of a sand-slope, two hours to reach the skeletons of a man and a mule. The land was losing its battle with time. Ancient and exhausted, it visited decrepitude on everything within its bounds, as though out of spleen.”

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Book:The Etched City
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“As they gently lowered it into the earth, all stared silently at the coffin but one: a young woman of twenty-five who glanced absentmindedly into the distance where an unknown figure stood – watching, waiting, his face buried in the shadow of his hat. Whether by intuition or paranoia she could not tell, but the presence of the man troubled her and her eyes were fixed on his motionless body and would not stir. Tourists rarely came to a town as small and uneventful as theirs, let alone to visit a funeral where they did not introduce themselves and only beheld the spectacle from afar.”

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Book:Exogenesis
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“Carcass. Cut in half. Stunner. Slaughter line. Spray wash. These words appear in his head and strike him. Destroy him. But they’re not just words. They’re the blood, the dense smell, the automation, the absence of thought. They burst in on the night, catch him off guard. When he wakes, his body is covered in a film of sweat because he knows that what awaits is another day of slaughtering humans.”

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Book:Tender Is the Flesh
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“Jaron stood on top of a hill, staring blankly into the distance and taking in every detail of the scene unfolding below him. To his back the sun was setting, casting its last rays over the field below and painting the sky around him in a vast array of red and gold. He shuddered slightly as a cool breeze blew gently through the tall grass of the field, nipping sharply at his cheeks which had gone numb from standing exposed to the elements for too long. It was a seemingly perfect fall day, and he couldn’t help but feel that it was somewhat ironic that it was on this day life as he knew it was coming to an end.”

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Author:K. R. Fajardo
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“About an hour outside of Chicago, as you drive north toward Wisconsin, there is a man sitting in the basement of an old farmhouse, wringing his pale, white hands. In fact, his entire nude body is covered in a white dust, a powder, a singular tear running down his right cheek. His overweight body hangs in folds over the edges of his frame, the tiny, brown stool straining under the weight. There is a singular light bulb overheard, and it is doing a poor job illuminating the cold concrete, but maybe that’s not such a bad thing. (Clown Face)”

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Book:Spontaneous Human Combustion
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“The family heard that the meteor shower would be visible from the cornfields of northern Illinois, just twenty minutes away from their sedentary suburban bliss, but Robert had been sleepless for weeks already, images flickering across his dreams—shadows and voices, a burning sensation running all the way to his core. They were mother and father, sister and brother—nothing special, rows of houses the same, but in blue, or yellow, or brick. But for the boy, half of a set of twins, all the magic and wonder rested in his cells—the darkness and vengeance in his sister, Rebecca. So as they snuffed out the lights of the family sedan, hand in hand down a dirt path the boy had mapped out, trust so easy to come by in this family—the girl sparked danger in her squinting eyes, as the boy’s ever widened to the stars, and possibility. Fresh cut grass lingered under buzzing power lines that disappeared as they stretched out to the horizon, a moist smell ripe with cleanliness and godliness—a hint of something sour underneath. The girl grinned as the rest held their noses, so eager she was to embrace death. (How Not to Come Undone)”

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Book:Spontaneous Human Combustion
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