Jonfaith

“In essence, France no longer existed. It existed only in the hatred of the French for one another.”
― Raymond Aron

“Don't forget the real business of war is buying and selling. The murdering and violence are self-policing, and can be entrusted to non-professionals. The mass nature of wartime death is useful in many ways. It serves as spectacle, as diversion from the real movements of the War. It provides raw material to be recorded into History, so that children may be taught History as sequences of violence, battle after battle, and be more prepared for the adult world. Best of all, mass death's a stimolous to just ordinary folks, little fellows, to try 'n' grab a piece of that Pie while they're still here to gobble it up. The true war is a celebration of markets.”
― Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow

“Ol' man river,
Dat ol' man river
He mus'know sumpin'
But don't say nuthin',
He jes'keeps rollin'
He keeps on rollin' along.”
― Oscar Hammerstein II

“I have a lot of work to do today;
I need to slaughter memory,
Turn my living soul to stone
Then teach myself to live again.”
― Anna Akhmatova, The Complete Poems of Anna Akhmatova