Other people's lives come at us without a backstory most of the time. The present is like that.
Interpretation
We often observe others' lives without understanding their complexities and histories, much like how we perceive the present moment.
This quote by Tom Stoppard suggests that our understanding of other people's experiences is often superficial and devoid of context. Just as we perceive the present moment without its backstory, we tend to judge others without considering their life circumstances, leading to misunderstandings and a lack of empathy. It serves as a reminder to look deeper than surface appearances in both our interactions with others and our understanding of the present moment.
In practice
In a discussion about the importance of empathy during a workshop.
Love is - OK, it's 20 things, but it isn't 19. And I think that love reaches for something which is very, very deep in us and is very easily obscured, and is also very easily denied, which is the instinct towards the other person, other than toward the self.
A movie camera is like having someone you have a crush on watching you from afar - you pretend it's not there.
I once did a radio program with a famous materialist, that is to say a scientist who believed that absolutely everything was physical and that all emotions were reductive to little electrical impulses in your neurons. And I found that I didn't believe that. But what the emotions really are, I don't have an alternative theory.
One of the reasons why there are so many versions of Chekhov is that translations date in a way that the original doesn't; translations seem to be of their time.
A Chinaman of the T'ang Dynasty—and, by which definition, a philosopher—dreamed he was a butterfly, and from that moment he was never quite sure that he was not a butterfly dreaming it was a Chinese philosopher. Envy him; in his two-fold security.
Chekhov directors and Chekhov actors love working on his plays because there seems to be no end to what you can find out about the micro-narrative when you're investigating a text.
A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.
The public good is in nothing more essentially interested, than in the protection of every individual's private rights.
An independent state does not pay too dear a price for its independence in accepting the sufferings of war when it cannot avoid them; a state which has lost its independence may find at least some compensation in the fact that its protector procures for it peace with its neighbours.
The point of asylum is not to declare to the world what country you think is the pinnacle of civilization. The point of asylum is to find a country that's both willing and able to protect you from political persecution. In no way is asylum an endorsement of a country's politics, laws, or values.
The human body is always treated as an image of society.
And before long , the msuic , the views rushing past the window , my fathers voice and the narrow cobblestone streets all merged into one , and it seemed to me that while we would never find answers to these fundamental questions , it was good for us to ask them anyway . pg. 284
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