I think it’s realistic to have hope. One can be a perverse idealist and say the easiest thing: ‘I despair. The world’s no good.’ That’s a perverse idealist. It’s practical to hope, because the hope is for us to survive as a human species. That’s very realistic.
There are nascent stirrings in the neighborhood and in the field, articulated by non-celebrated people who bespeak the dreams of their fellows. It may be catching. Unfortunately, it is not covered on the six o’clock news.
I suppose if I have an epitaph it would be: “Curiosity Did Not Kill This Cat.” I don’t see retiring in the sense that we view it – I don’t see how I could. Dying at the microphone or at the typewriter would not be bad.
You know, ‘power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’? It’s the same with powerlessness. Absolute powerlessness corrupts absolutely. Einstein said everything had changed since the atom was split, except the way we think. We have to think anew.
One of the definitive works on gay life. Through this collective testimony we may come to understand what it is to be ‘the other’; in short, the other part of ourselves.
People are hungry for stories. It’s part of our very being. Storytelling is a form of history, of immortality too. It goes from one generation to another. -Studs Terkel
I said, “Suppose communists come out against cancer, do we have to automatically come out for cancer?'” I can’t take back that I’m against the poll tax, that I’m against lynching, that I’m for peace.
