We are a culture that has been denied, or has passively given up, the linguistic and intellectual tools to cope with complexity, to separate illustion from reality. We have traded the printed word for the gleaming image. Public rhetoric is designed to be comprehensible to a ten-year-old child or an adult with a sixth-grade reading level. Most of us speak at this level, are entertained and think at this level. We have transformed our culture into a vast replica of Pinocchio’s Pleasure Island, where boys were lured with the promise of no school and endless fun. Theyw ere all, however, turned into donkeys — a symbol, in Italian culture, of ignorance and stupidity.
— Chris Hedges
Hey you kids, get off my lawn.
BTW – I am really enjoying these, Burt. It’s like having one of those quote of the day desk calendars.
Thanks. I’ve got about a month and a half of them queued up already, which no doubt has irritated Will because it clutters up the first two pages of the blog’s dashboard. But what else am I to do with all these great little gems of writing?
I will admit that my first thought was “Oh, crap.” But I like the concept, and might start joining in at #46.
Indeed, Will, feel free to rearrange them and intersperse some of your own. I’ve got a bunch from Martin and a bunch from Hedges, and I don’t want to repeat authors too closely in time to themselves.
I have to confess, my response to thoughts along these lines is not entirely favorable. A part of me thinks there is a resentment that entertainment and the arts can now be enjoyed by lesser people. Or, at least, people of lesser intellectual ambition.
I have friends who will never forgive the Catholic Church for moving away from Latin Mass. As though there is some resentment to the commoner being able to actually understand His Word.
Of course, I dig biblical passages being in oldy-style language, even if it is a bit harder to understand. And I don’t *think* making it harder to understand is the point of my preference, though Gordon Atkinson might disagree.