The single most amazing phenomenon is the discrediting of idealism. Susan Sontag More Quotes by Susan Sontag More Quotes From Susan Sontag Surrealism can only deliver a reactionary judgment; can make out of history only an accumulation of oddities, a joke, a death trip. Susan Sontag accumulation oddities judgment The shock of photographed atrocities wears off with repeated viewings, just as the surprise and bemusement felt the first time one sees a pornographic movie wear off after one sees a few more. Susan Sontag atrocities surprise firsts Photography is, first of all, a way of seeing. Susan Sontag photography way firsts We live under continual threat of two equally fearful, but seemingly opposed destinies: unremitting banality and inconceivable terror. It is fantasy, served out in large rations by the popular arts, which allows most people to cope with these twin specters. Susan Sontag destiny writing art Travel becomes a strategy for accumulating photographs. Susan Sontag inspirational funny travel No 'we' should be taken for granted when the subject is looking at other people's pain. Susan Sontag pain taken people I discovered that I am tired of being a person. Not just tired of being the person I was, but any person at all Susan Sontag tired persons Communism is fascism with a human face. Susan Sontag fascism communism faces In place of a hermeneutics we need an erotics of art. Susan Sontag hermeneutics art needs Images have been reproached for being a way of watching suffering at a distance, as if there were some other way of watching. Susan Sontag distance suffering way Wherever people feel safe — they will be indifferent. Susan Sontag indifferent safe people Photography - the supreme form of travel, of tourism - is the principal modern means for enlarging the world. As a branch of art, photography's enterprise of world enlargement tends to specialize in the subjects felt to be challenging, transgressive. A photograph may be telling us: this too exists. And that. And that. (And it is all 'human.') But what are we to do with this knowledge - if indeed it is knowledge, about, say, the self, about abnormality, about ostracized or clandestine worlds? Susan Sontag photography mean art There are some elements in life - above all, sexual pleasure - about which it isn't necessary to have a position. Susan Sontag position elements pleasure Mozart, Pascal, Boolean algebra, Shakespeare, parliamentary government, baroque churches, Newton, the emancipation of women, Kant, Balanchine ballets, et al. don’t redeem what this particular civilization has wrought upon the world. The white race is the cancer of human history. Susan Sontag cancer government race To patronize the faculty of taste is to patronize oneself. For taste governs every free - as opposed to rote - human response. Susan Sontag faculty response taste I feel inauthentic at a party. ... Going to a party is a 'low' activity - the authentic self is compromised, fragmented - one plays 'roles.' One isn't fully present, beyond role-playing. One doesn't (can't) tell the full truth, which means one is lying, even if one doesn't literally tell lies. Susan Sontag party truth lying Quotation is a method of appropriation which is invincible, I think. It's not a procedure which displeases me, contrary to recycling. Susan Sontag recycling procedures thinking I believe that courage is morally neutral. I can well imagine wicked people being brave and good people being timid or afraid. I don't consider it a moral virtue. Susan Sontag brave believe people What makes me feel strong? Being in love and work. I must work. Susan Sontag being-in-love strong feels War is elective. It is not an inevitable state of affairs. War is not the weather. Susan Sontag affair weather war
