“As soon as A observes something which seems to him to be wrong, from which X is suffering, A talks it over with B, and A and B then propose to get a law passed to remedy the evil and help X. Their law always proposes to determine what C shall do for X, or in the better case, what A, B, and C shall do for X…. What I want to do is to look up C. I want to show you what manner of man he is. I call him the Forgotten Man. Perhaps the appellation is not strictly correct. He is the man who never is thought of…. He works, he votes, generally he prays—but he always pays…. —WILLIAM GRAHAM SUMNER, YALE UNIVERSITY, 1883”
― The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression
― The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression
“In Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s great novel The Brothers Karamazov, there is a scene in which two people are talking about suffering. Ivan Karamazov is talking about there being any possibility that we can make sense of suffering, and here’s what he says: “I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world’s finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, of all the blood that they’ve shed; that it will make it not only possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened.”11”
― Encounters with Jesus: Unexpected Answers to Life's Biggest Questions
― Encounters with Jesus: Unexpected Answers to Life's Biggest Questions
“There are very few certainties in this world, Mr. Gilbert, but I will tell you something I know: the truth depends on who it is that’s telling the story.”
― The Clockmaker's Daughter
― The Clockmaker's Daughter
“I have a childlike conviction that the sufferings will be healed and smoothed over, that the whole offensive comedy of human contradiction will disappear like a pitiful mirage, a vile concoction of man's Euclidean mind, feeble and puny as an atom, and that ultimately, at the world's finale, in that moment of eternal harmony, there will occur and be revealed something so precious that it will suffice for all hearts, to allay all indignation, to redeem all human villainy, all bloodshed; it will suffice not only to make forgiveness possible, but also to justify everything that has happened with men -- let this, let off of this, come true and be revealed.”
― The Brothers Karamazov
― The Brothers Karamazov
“Sentimentality was mawkish and cloying, where nostalgia was acute and aching. It described yearning of the most profound kind: an awareness that time’s passage could not be stopped and there was no going back to reclaim a moment or a person or to do things differently.”
― The Clockmaker's Daughter
― The Clockmaker's Daughter
The Official Jane Austen Book Club
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Whether you're new to Jane Austen or an avid Janeite, you'll have fun in this inclusive group for all who love Jane Austen. Feel free to flail in the ...more
Hannah’s 2025 Year in Books
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