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“For in the end, he was trying to tell us what afflicted the people in 'Brave New World' was not that they were laughing instead of thinking, but that they did not know what they were laughing about and why they had stopped thinking.”
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
“When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.”
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
“Everything in our background has prepared us to know and resist a prison when the gates begin to close around us . . . But what if there are no cries of anguish to be heard? Who is prepared to take arms against a sea of amusements? To whom do we complain, and when, and in what tone of voice, when serious discourse dissolves into giggles? What is the antidote to a culture's being drained by laughter?”
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
“[M]ost of our daily news is inert, consisting of information that gives us something to talk about but cannot lead to any meaningful action. (68).”
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
“The reader must come armed , in a serious state of intellectual readiness. This is not easy because he comes to the text alone. In reading, one's responses are isolated, one'sintellect thrown back on its own resourses. To be confronted by the cold abstractions of printed sentences is to look upon language bare, without the assistance of either beauty or community. Thus, reading is by its nature a serious business. It is also, of course, an essentially rational activity.”
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
― Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business
Alexandra’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Alexandra’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
137 books
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14 friends
264 books
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16 friends
70 books
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2 friends
47 books
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2 friends
278 books
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65 friends
86 books
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2 friends
Favorite Genres
Art, Biography, Business, Classics, Contemporary, History, Humor and Comedy, Memoir, Music, Mystery, Non-fiction, Philosophy, Poetry, Psychology, Religion, Romance, Science, Self help, Suspense, Spirituality, and Travel
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