We drift down time, clutching at straws. But what good's a brick to a drowning man?
Interpretation
This quote suggests that in desperate situations, we often grasp at futile solutions. It highlights the absurdity of relying on ineffective help when we are in real trouble.
Tom Stoppard's quote reflects on the human tendency to seek solutions even when those solutions are impractical or ineffective, particularly during moments of crisis. The imagery of 'drifting down time' indicates a passive approach to life's challenges, while 'clutching at straws' signifies desperate attempts to find hope in unlikely places. Ultimately, the metaphor of ‘a brick to a drowning man’ underscores the futility of relying on heavy and unsuitable help when what is needed is something that can truly save us.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming challenges, one might quote this to illustrate how misguided efforts can lead to more frustration.
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.
In time of war, the loudest patriots are the greatest profiteers.
Man's main task in life is to give birth to himself, to become what he potentially is. The most important product of his effort is his own personality.
Our citizenship in the United States is our national character. Our citizenship in any particular state is only our local distinction. By the latter we are known at home, by the former to the world. Our great title is AMERICANS.
All things are God's already; we can give him no right, by consecrating any, that he had not before, only we set it apart to his service - just as a gardener brings his master a basket of apricots, and presents them; his lord thanks him, and perhaps gives him something for his pains, and yet the apricots were as much his lord's before as now.
Peace is liberty in tranquillity.
A true symbol appears only when there is a need to express what thought cannot think or what is only divined or felt.
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