Sign in with Facebook
Dawn
https://www.goodreads.com/dawn83184
But, in the strange dizziness of that moment, the statue every man eventually erects and that hardens in the fire of the years, into which he then creeps and there awaits its final crumbling—that statue was rapidly cracking, it was already
...more
“It is not a matter of approaching a fixed limit: absolute Knowledge or the happiness of man or the perfection of beauty; all human effort would then be doomed to failure, for with each step forward the horizon recedes a step; for man it is a matter of pursuing the expansion of his existence and of retrieving this very effort as an absolute. Science”
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
“Science condemns itself to failure when, yielding to the infatuation of the serious, it aspires to attain being, to contain it, and to possess it; but it finds its truth if it considers itself as a free engagement of thought in the given, aiming, at each discovery, not at fusion with the thing, but at the possibility of new discoveries; what the mind then projects is the concrete accomplishment of its freedom.”
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
“What stops them is that as soon as they give the word “end” its double meaning of goal and fulfillment they clearly perceive this ambiguity of their condition, which is the most fundamental of all: that every living movement is a sliding toward death. But if they are willing to look it in the face they also discover that every movement toward death is life.”
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
― The Ethics of Ambiguity
“As for myself: I had come to the conclusion that there was nothing sacred about myself or about any human being, that we were all machines, doomed to collide and collide and collide. For want of anything better to do, we became fans of collisions. Sometimes I wrote well about collisions, which meant I was a writing machine in good repair. Sometimes I wrote badly, which meant I was a writing machine in bad repair. I no more harbored sacredness than did a Pontiac, a mousetrap, or a South Bend Lathe.”
― Breakfast of Champions
― Breakfast of Champions
“When a man becomes a writer, I think he takes on a sacred obligation to produce beauty and enlightenment and comfort at top speed.” “I just can’t help thinking what a real shaking up it would give people if, all of a sudden, there were no new books, new plays, new histories, new poems… “And how proud would you be when people started dying like flies?” I demanded. “They’d die more like mad dogs, I think—snarling and snapping at each other and biting their own tails.” I turned to Castle the elder. “Sir, how does a man die when he’s deprived of the consolations of literature?” “In one of two ways,” he said, “petrescence of the heart or atrophy of the nervous system.” “Neither one very pleasant, I expect,” I suggested.”
― Cat's Cradle
― Cat's Cradle
The 1700-1939 Book Club!
— 610 members
— last activity Nov 28, 2025 06:50PM
This group is for books written from 1700-1939*. I created this group because there are so many exciting and classic books written during this time. T ...more
Bright Young Things
— 1220 members
— last activity Apr 24, 2026 11:39AM
...the perfect place for you to discuss your favourite authors from the early 20th Century. In the years from 1900 to 1945 the world of literature w ...more
Dawn’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Dawn’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
92 books
|
25 friends
482 books
|
44 friends
164 books
|
61 friends
528 books
|
355 friends
152 books
|
6 friends
13 books
|
7 friends
0 books
|
2 friends
0 books
|
64 friends
More friends…
Favorite Genres
Polls voted on by Dawn
Lists liked by Dawn
