Charles Percy Snow Quotes

Isn't it in the nature of intellectuals to be culture critics?

Many Americans don't like the simple things. That's what they have against conservatives.

I think Marilyn Manson has a better take on America than Michael Moore and I don't think he's appreciated for his intellect.

Parts exist only for purposes of figuring and describing, and as we figure the world out we become confused if we do not remember this all the time.

Society is a hospital of incurables.

What interests me is to understand the nature of the modern.

I really wanted to make a nonpolitical political film. I wanted something that folks in red states and blue states could look at and not ask if this is the right thing to do to be in this war, but what this war is doing to the fabric of our society.

In all aspects of life... we define our reality in terms of metaphors and then proceed to act on the basis of the metaphors. We draw inferences, set goals, make commitments, and execute plans, all on the basis of how we in part structure our experience, consciously and unconsciously, by means of metaphor.

To know just what has do be done, then to do it, comprises the whole philosophy of practical life.

The world is a bundle of hay, Mankind are the asses that pull, Each tugs in a different way And the greatest of all is John Bull!

The idea of abstract power only exists for academics, not in real life.

You're building a tool, not a piece of art. Don't be blinded by the vision.

Anti-Americanism is as old as the Republic--a historical constant, which is only remotely related to specific American behavior. So what is new? Andrei Markovits has delivered the best answer yet, ranging across an astounding wealth of material from politics and culture. Uncouth Nation is a rare academic treat. Rigorous and analytical, the book is also a pleasure to read as it penetrates a critical issue of our time.

I'm just a journalist. I shine a mirror to the culture. I give the cop-out answer.

The purpose of our practice is just to be yourself.

So, that is my final lesson from the universe - you just do what you need to do, and stay on track.

The literary wiseacres prognosticate in many languages, as they have throughout so many centuries, setting the stage for new hautmonde in letters and making up the public's mind.

In the Fiji islands, it appears, cannibalism is now familiar. They eat thier own wives and children. We only devour widows' houses, and great merchants outwit and absorb the substance of small ones, and every man feeds on his neighbor's labor if he can. It is a milder form of cannibalism.

Leonard Pitts, Jr. is the most insightful and inspiring columnist of his generation.

I would never use a long word, even, where a short one would answer the purpose.

I don't know," I said. "Maybe you're right, and all that stuff I think I missed is overrated. Why should I even bother? What's the point really?" He thought for a moment. "Who says there has to be a point?" he asked. "Or a reason. Maybe it's just something you have to do." He moved down to start bagging while I just stood there, letting this sink in. Just something you have to do. No excuse or rationale necessary. I kind of like that.

Believing, with Max Weber, that man is an animal suspended in webs of significance he himself has spun, I take culture to be those webs, and the analysis of it to be therefore not an experimental science in search of law but an interpretive one in search of meaning.

I would trade all of my technology for an afternoon with Socrates.

I think the meaning of life is life itself. We don't necessarily want to know what it is, but we want to live it. Hopefully, we'll go out fast without knowing it.