There's a reticence necessary when you consider the suffering of others. Into the space created by that reticence, … - Teju Cole

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Man's greatness consists in his ability to do and the proper application of his powers to things needed to be done.

Teju Cole

There's a reticence necessary when you consider the suffering of others. Into the space created by that reticence, you bring in those things that best help us confront ambiguity: music, painting, film, and so on.

Confront, Created, Helping, Necessary, Space, Suffering Of Others

Same Author Quotes

Oh, I love labels, as long as they are numerous. I'm an American writer. I'm a Nigerian writer. I'm a Nigerian American writer. I'm an African writer. I'm a Yoruba writer. I'm an African American writer. I'm a writer who's been strongly influenced by European precedents. I'm a writer who feels very close to literary practice in India - which I go to quite often - and to writers over there.

African American, Long, Practice, Strongly, Writer

I suddenly feel a vague pity for all those writers who have to ply their trade from sleepy American suburbs, writing divorce scenes symbolized by the very slow washing of dishes.

Writing, Divorce, Plies, Pity, Dishes

I just realized that we're facing here is an empathy gap. And this was just another way to generate conversation about something that nobody wanted to look at.

Empathy, Looks, Gaps, Look, Gap

The shape the words end up taking are themselves the meaning of the words, they are retrospectively what we meant to say. There's no way of knowing this until you register it in visible form. But the other side of this is that you do have some idea of where you are going.

Idea, Ideas, Knowing, Register, Shapes, Way

It is dangerous to live in a secure world.

Dangerous, Live, Secure, World

Similar Quotes

Anne Frank

And finally I twist my heart round again, so that the bad is on the outside and the good is on the inside, and keep on trying to find a way of becoming what I would so like to be, and could be, if there weren't any other people living in the world.

Bad, Heart, People, Round, Trying

Confucius

You can successfully force people to follow a certain course, but you cannot force them to understand it.

Certain, Follow, Force, People, Successfully, Understand

Deborah Eisenberg

The task is not primarily to have a story, but to penetrate the story, to discard the elements of it that are merely shell, or husk, that give apparent form to the story, but actually obscure the essence. In other words, the problem is to transcend the givens of a narrative.

Essence, Giving, Tasks, Give, Penetrate

Viktor Schauberger

We must look into unknown dimensions, into Nature, into that incalculable and imponderable life, whose carrier and mediator, the blood of the Earth that accompanies us steadfastly from the cradle to the grave, is water.

Accompanies, Accompany Us, Blood, Incalculable, Mediator, Water

Frederick Douglass