The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Search results for “meaningful”

This Is Water: David Foster Wallace on Life
This Is Water: David Foster Wallace on Life

Revisiting the tragic literary hero’s only public insights on life.

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The Forms of Things Unknown: A Timeless 1963 Meditation on the Role of the Creative Arts in Society
The Forms of Things Unknown: A Timeless 1963 Meditation on the Role of the Creative Arts in Society

“Art must lead beyond the arts, to an awareness and a share of mutuality.”

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Significant Objects: How Stories Confer Value Upon the Vacant
Significant Objects: How Stories Confer Value Upon the Vacant

“It turns out that once you start increasing the emotional energy of inanimate objects, an unpredictable chain reaction is set off.”

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100 Ideas That Changed Architecture
100 Ideas That Changed Architecture

How the art and science of building evolved along the parallel axes of the philosophical and the pragmatic.

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How To Talk About Books You Haven’t Read
How To Talk About Books You Haven’t Read

“Non-reading is not just the absence of reading. It is a genuine activity, one that consists of adopting a stance in relation to the immense tide of books that protects you from drowning. On that basis, it deserves to be defended and even taught.”

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The Science of “Chunking,” Working Memory, and How Pattern Recognition Fuels Creativity
The Science of “Chunking,” Working Memory, and How Pattern Recognition Fuels Creativity

“Generating interesting connections between disparate subjects is what makes art so fascinating to create and to view… We are forced to contemplate a new, higher pattern that binds lower ones together.”

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Charles Darwin’s List of the Pros and Cons of Marriage
Charles Darwin’s List of the Pros and Cons of Marriage

“My God, it is intolerable to think of spending one’s whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all.”

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Maira Kalman on Identity, Happiness, and Existence
Maira Kalman on Identity, Happiness, and Existence

“How are we so optimistic, so careful not to trip and yet do trip, and then get up and say OK?”

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Fatherly Advice from Famous Dads
Fatherly Advice from Famous Dads

“The secret of success is concentrating interest in life… interest in the small things of nature… In other words to be fully awake to everything.”

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An Unquiet History of Libraries and Navigating Knowledge, from Alexandria to the Internet
An Unquiet History of Libraries and Navigating Knowledge, from Alexandria to the Internet

“…texts, fabrics to be shredded and woven together in new combinations and patterns…”

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