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Kurt Vonnegut on Reading, Boredom, Belonging, and Hate

Kurt Vonnegut on Reading, Boredom, Belonging, and Hate
by Maria Popova “Hate, in the long run, is about as nourishing as cyanide.” What makes the commencement address such a singular pinnacle of the communication arts is that, in an era where religion is increasingly being displaced by culture and secular thought, it offers a secular version of the sermon — a packet of guidance on how to be a good human being and lead a good life. It is also one of the few cultural contexts in which a patronizing attitude, in the original sense of the term, is not only acceptable but desired — after all, the very notion of the graduation speech calls for a patronly father figure or matronly mother figure to get up at the podium and impart to young people hard-earned, experience-tested wisdom on how to live well. Kurt Vonnegut — a man of discipline, a champion of literary style, modern sage, poetic shaman of happiness, and one wise dad — endures as one of the most prolific and sought-after commencement speakers of all time. We are supposed to be bored.

America’s Bicentennial Poem This is Part 12 of The Universal Emancipation Proclamation : All Art is a gift of the Holy Spirit. When this light shines through the mind of a musician, it manifests itself in beautiful harmonies. Again, shining through the mind of a poet, it is seen in fine poetry and poetic prose. – Abdu’l-Baha, The Chosen Highway, p. 167. During America’s Bicentennial celebration of the Declaration of Independence in 1976, Baha’i poet Robert Hayden served as Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. American Journal Robert Hayden Robert E. here among them the americans this baffling multi people extremes and variegations their noise restlessness their almost frightening energy how best describe these aliens in my reports to The Counselors disguise myself in order to study them unobserved adapting their varied pigmentations white black red brown yellow the imprecise and strangering distinctions by which they live by which they justify their cruelties to one another for their importance and identity

24 Haunting Images Of Abandoned Places That Will Give You Goose Bumps. #16 Is Insane. 1. I.M. Cooling Tower, Belgium These are parts of a cooling tower in an old power station in Monceau, Belgium. 2. Kolmanskop was a small settlement in Namibia that saw a boom in the early 1900s when German settlers realized that the area was rich in diamonds. 3. 102-Year-Old Floating Forest in Sydney, Australia This is the hull of the SS Ayrfield, a large steam ship condemned to dismantling in Homebush Bay, Australia after WWII. 4. The Maunsell Sea Forts were erected near the Thames and Mersey rivers in Britain to help defend against potential German air or naval raids during WWII. 5. This house was part of what was once a fairly successful small island colony in Chesapeake Bay in the U.S. 6. Pripyat was established on Feb. 4th, 1970 in Ukraine near the border of Belarus as a Soviet nuclear city. 7. The former headquarters of Bulgaria’s Communist Party are just as eerie on the outside as on the inside. 8. The Nara Dreamland park, inspired by Disneyland, was opened in 1961. 9. 10. 11.

How Should We Live: History’s Forgotten Wisdom on Love, Time, Family, Empathy, and Other Aspects of the Art of Living by Maria Popova “How to pursue the art of living has become the great quandary of our age… The future of the art of living can be found by gazing into the past.” “He who cannot draw on three thousand years is living from hand to mouth,” Goethe famously proclaimed. Thomas Hobbes extolled “the principal and proper work of history being to instruct, and enable men by the knowledge of actions past to bear themselves prudently in the present and providently in the future.” It is this notion of “applied history” that cultural historian and philosopher Roman Krznaric — who gave us How to Find Fulfilling Work, one of the best psychology and philosophy books of 2013 — places at the center of How Should We Live? He writes in the introduction: How to pursue the art of living has become the great quandary of our age.[…]I believe that the future of the art of living can be found by gazing into the past. The Histomap by John Sparks, 1931. George Orwell On some level we fear boredom. How Should We Live?

Charles Bukowski’s Top 10 Tips For Living A Kick-Ass Life Looking for some pointers on how to live an awesome life? Take it from Charles Bukowski, an American author, poet, short story writer, and novelist who shared his unfiltered views and opinions with the world on everything from art to death. He was a renowned and prolific writer, often depicting the experiences of the downtrodden and depraved people of American urban life, and he provided plenty of great tips on how to spend your days. But don’t just take my word for it, soak up the wisdom with this valuable advice from some his most well-known quotes. 1. Don’t settle. “I wanted the whole world or nothing.” You shouldn’t settle for anything less than what you absolutely deserve or desire. 2. “I never met another man I’d rather be. 3. “What is terrible is not death but the lives people live or don’t live up until their death.” “Some people never go crazy, What truly horrible lives they must live.” Want to go skydiving but have never done it? 4. 5. 6. 7. “I carry death in my left pocket. 8.

The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success:Amazon:Books How Diego Rivera Met the Fierce Teenage Frida Kahlo and Fell in Love with Her Years Later by Maria Popova “I did not know it then, but Frida had already become the most important fact in my life. And she would continue to be, up to the moment she died…” There is something singularly mesmerizing about the fateful encounters that sparked epic, often turbulent, lifelong love affairs — take, for instance, Gertrude Stein and Alice B. In a section titled An Apparition of Frida, Rivera describes his first encounter with the fierce teenage Kahlo while painting his first significant mural, Creation, at the Bolívar Auditorium of the National Preparatory School in Mexico City in 1922. Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo in Mexico, 1933 (Photograph by Martin Munkácsi) While painting, I suddenly heard, from behind one of the colonial pillars in the spacious room, the voice of an unseen girl.Teasingly, she shouted, “On guard, Diego, Nahui is coming!” 'Nothing compares to your hands, nothing like the green-gold of your eyes. It wasn’t until several years later that the two crossed paths again.

Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion:Amazon:Kindle Store Movers and makers: the most powerful people in the art world | Art and design Gerhard Richter The greatest painter alive, and the most fastidious: his Cologne studio is spotless, every brush and squeegee clean. His diaries are a hoot too: "Art is wretched, cynical, stupid, helpless, confusing … worse than insanity" Ai Weiwei The most famous artist since Warhol, and a true polymath: sculptor, architect, digital pioneer, questionable heavy metal musician. Jeff Koons Cloyingly earnest, unfailingly polite and richer than you'll ever be. Cindy Sherman Conceptualist whose three decades of staged self-portraits – as a clown, as an heiress, as a Renaissance Madonna – transformed the reception of photography in museums and the market. Damien Hirst Like any shark, he has to keep moving to breathe. Isa Genzken If some kid's art looks innovative today, it's safe to assume Genzken did it 20 years ago. Matthew Barney Devastatingly handsome Yalie, baby-daddy to Björk, and the only heterosexual to spend a decade making art about muscles that raise and lower the testicles. Agnes Gund

Books That Predicted The Future - Books - ShortList Magazine George Orwell's famous 1984 described an all-seeing state capable of watching our every move - of course, this would be some far-off dystopian vision of the future, right? Well, old George's prediction is very much in evidence now, with security cameras, internet tracking and the like - and a surprising amount of other writers have been able to predict the future with unerring accuracy. This brilliant infographic, made by printerinks.com, shows various fictional predictions that ended up coming true, and the time that lapsed between forecast and reality - click on it to see a bigger version. Having said all this - if they were that good at predicting the future, they could have made a fortune on the football pools, so maybe they were using their talents in the wrong area. (Image: printerinks.com)

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