Elizabeth Janeway
Elizabeth Janeway
Elizabeth Janewaywas an American author and critic...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth7 October 1913
CountryUnited States of America
wisdom betrayal advice
I am not sure how many "sins" I would recognize in the world. Some would surely be defused by changed circumstances. But I can imagine none that is more irredeemably sinful than the betrayal, the exploitation, of the young by those who should care for them.
joints action activism
Mistrust must be acted on, and effective action by the ruled is not solitary and singular, but joint and repeated.
dream art shapes
art is a framework, a kind of living trellis, on which public dreaming can shape itself ...
love-is sexuality paradigm
Love between women is seen as a paradigm of love between equals, and that is perhaps its greatest attraction.
mean technology thinking
How can you communicate your thoughts or demonstrate your hypotheses by conventional means when all the values and standards that you want to challenge are built into those means? Science and new technology today like to declare that they encourage 'lateral thinking,' new ways of seeing and putting data together - but all systems have an inbuilt resistance to what has not been programmed into them through the premises on which their rules are based.
arguing problem dilemma
a problem that presents itself as a dilemma carries an unfortunate prescription: to argue instead of act.
long despair
those who despair of life are not long for it.
together labels world
we expect definitions to tell us not only what is, but what to do about it; to show us how the world fits together and how its different parts connect and work. ... A label is the first step toward action.
fall conflict controversy
Can one consider controversy without falling into it?
change eye world
If one is going to change things, one has to make a fuss and catch the eye of the world.
change enemy legends
Myth, legend, and ritual ... function to maintain a status quo. That makes them singularly bad in coping with change, indeed counterproductive, for change is the enemy of myth.
change powerful fear
power is not a thing to be owned. But if you believe that it is such a thing, losing it becomes a possibility to fear. That fear, I think, is one reason for the dark projections of a catastrophic future that are so widespread, in our dual society. The present powerful, being committed to polarization, expect that any new deal will overturn the one that set them in authority; that the last shall be first and the first last, role reversal everywhere, men as slaves, women as masters, in a revolution of contradiction.
trying authenticity guilty
Unless I am what I am and feel what I feel - as hard as I can and as honestly and truly as I can - then I am nothing. Let me feel guilty ... don't try to educate me ... don't protect me.
philosophical wine world
Creeds and causal systems have argued with each other for millennia, and even so we and our ancestors have managed to live in a world of differing opinions. Philosophical disputes don't often affect the price of fish or wine.