Paul Fussell
Paul Fussell
Paul Fussell, Jr.was an American cultural and literary historian, author and university professor. His writings cover a variety of topics, from scholarly works on eighteenth-century English literature to commentary on America's class system. Fussell served in the 103rd Infantry Division during World War II and was wounded in fighting in France. Returning to the US, Fussell wrote extensively and held several faculty positions, most prominently at Rutgers Universityin New Brunswick, New Jersey, and at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia,...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionHistorian
Date of Birth22 March 1924
CountryUnited States of America
I find nothing more depressing than optimism.
Tourism requires that you see conventional things, and that you see them in a conventional way.
Travel sharpens the senses. Abroad one feels, sees and hears things in an abnormal way.
Most people who seek attention and regard by announcing that they're writing a novel are actually so devoid of narrative talent that they can't hold the attention of a dinner table for thirty seconds, even with a dirty joke.
The worst thing about war was the sitting around and wondering what you were doing morally.
The balls used in top class games are generally smaller than those used in others.
Every war is ironic because every war is worse than expected. Every war constitutes an irony of situation because its means are so melodramatically disproportionate to its presumed ends.
Chickenshit refers to behavior that makes military life worse than it need be: petty harassment of the weak by the strong; open scrimmage for power and authority and prestige; sadism thinly disguised as necessary discipline; a constant 'paying off of old scores'; and insistence on the letter rather than the spirit of ordinances.
The more violent the body contact of the sports you watch, the lower the class.
And the ideal travel writer is consumed not just with a will to know. He is also moved by a powerful will to teach.
If truth is the main casualty in war, ambiguity is another.
To get home you had to end the war. To end the war was the reason you fought it. The only reason.
What someone doesn't want you to publish is journalism; all else is publicity.
Today the Somme is a peaceful but sullen place, unforgetting and unforgiving. ... To wander now over the fields destined to extrude their rusty metal fragments for centuries is to appreciate in the most intimate way the permanent reverberations of July, 1916. When the air is damp you can smell rusted iron everywhere, even though you see only wheat and barley.