The Marginalian
The Marginalian

Reads tagged with “Susan Sontag”

Susan Sontag on the Crucial Difference Between Being in the Middle and Being at the Center
Susan Sontag on the Crucial Difference Between Being in the Middle and Being at the Center

Why true neutrality is not an abstinence from taking sides of but an act of compassion.

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Narrowly Selective Transparency: Susan Sontag on Photography vs. the Other Arts
Narrowly Selective Transparency: Susan Sontag on Photography vs. the Other Arts

“While a painting or a prose description can never be other than a narrowly selective interpretation, a photograph can be treated as a narrowly selective transparency.”

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Love, Sex, and the World Between
Love, Sex, and the World Between

“Part of the modern ideology of love is to assume that love and sex always go together… And probably the greatest problem for human beings is that they just don’t.”

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The 13 Best Biographies, Memoirs, and History Books of 2013
The 13 Best Biographies, Memoirs, and History Books of 2013

From Alan Turing to Susan Sontag, by way of a lost cat, a fierce Victorian lady-journalist, and some very odd creative habits.

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Letter to Borges: Susan Sontag on Books, Self-Transcendence, and Reading in the Age of Screens
Letter to Borges: Susan Sontag on Books, Self-Transcendence, and Reading in the Age of Screens

“Books are not only the arbitrary sum of our dreams, and our memory. They also give us the model of self-transcendence… a way of being fully human.”

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Susan Sontag on Beauty vs. Interestingness
Susan Sontag on Beauty vs. Interestingness

Defying consumerism and the banality of the beautiful, or why our capacity for astonishment endures.

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The Project of Literature: Susan Sontag on Writing, Routines, Education, and Elitism in a 1992 Recording from the 92Y Archives
The Project of Literature: Susan Sontag on Writing, Routines, Education, and Elitism in a 1992 Recording from the 92Y Archives

“A writer is someone who pays attention to the world — a writer is a professional observer.”

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Young vs. Old, Male vs. Female, Intuition vs. Intellect: Susan Sontag on How the Stereotypes and Polarities of Culture Imprison Us
Young vs. Old, Male vs. Female, Intuition vs. Intellect: Susan Sontag on How the Stereotypes and Polarities of Culture Imprison Us

“The young-old polarization and the male-female polarization are perhaps the two leading stereotypes that imprison people.”

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Susan Sontag on How the False Divide Between Pop Culture and “High” Culture Limits Us
Susan Sontag on How the False Divide Between Pop Culture and “High” Culture Limits Us

“There are contradictory impulses in everything.”

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Susan Sontag on Literature and Freedom
Susan Sontag on Literature and Freedom

“Literature can train, and exercise, our ability to weep for those who are not us or ours.”

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