A handful of works in history have had a direct impact on social policy: one or two works of Dickens, some of Zola, 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' and, in modern drama, Larry Kramer's 'The Normal Heart.'
Tony KushnerRead
If you know that life is basically going to be horrendously difficult, at best, and all but unlivable at worst, or possibly even unlivable, do you go on? And the choice to go on is the only thing that I think can be called hope. Because if hope isn't forced to encounter the worst possibility, then it's a lie.
Interpretation
Hope is a conscious choice made in the face of life's inevitable difficulties.
This quote highlights the struggle of human existence, emphasizing that life is fraught with challenges and hardships. Despite the overwhelming difficulties one may face, the act of choosing to continue living and clinging to hope is what gives life its meaning. Hope becomes a genuine force when it is faced with the potential for despair, making it a powerful and authentic aspect of the human experience.
In practice
During a motivational speech to inspire resilience in tough times.
A handful of works in history have had a direct impact on social policy: one or two works of Dickens, some of Zola, 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' and, in modern drama, Larry Kramer's 'The Normal Heart.'
Artists know that diligence counts as much, if not more, as inspiration; in art, as in politics, patience counts as much as revolution.
I don't understand why I'm not dead. When your heart breaks, you should die
In this world, there is a kind of painful progress. Longing for what we've left behind, and dreaming ahead.
The way that same-sex marriage should reach the federal level is that it absolutely should be decided by the Supreme Court as quickly as possible. It's a 14th Amendment issue. There's no argument about it.
Gay TV has been immensely important in transforming American culture in a more gay-positive direction.
Many a man renounces morals, but with great difficulty the conception, 'morality.' Morality is the 'idea' of morals, their intellectual power, their power over the conscience; on the other hand, morals are too material to rule the mind, and do not fetter an 'intellectual' man, a so-called independent, a 'freethinker.'
Some persons seem to like you, and others seem to hate you, and you must wonder why. They are simply liking machines and hating machines.
Common experience is the gold reserve which confers an exchange value on the currency which words are; without this reserve of shared experiences, all our pronouncements are checks drawn on insufficient funds.
Bombing is not especially inhumane. War itself is inhumane and the bombing plane, which is used to paralyse industry and transport, is a relatively civilised weapon. 'Normal' or 'legitimate' warfare is just as destructive of inanimate objects and enormously so of human lives.
All activities and events that a body is to go through are determined at the time of conception.
Asked whether or not he believed in an afterlife, Thoreau quipped, "One world at a time."
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