Friday Musings: A Curated Collection from the Quote Vault

In a world of rapid change and enduring questions, here are some quotes to roll around in your mind when you take a break from your screens. From Subroto Roy’s vision of a flourishing society, to voices as varied as Hannah Arendt, Martin Luther King Jr., Edward Snowden, and Graham Greene, quotes that illuminate the human condition dealing with justice and bureaucracy, creativity and resilience, perception and courage. 

I personally enjoy mashups of unrelated observations because the unplanned juxtapositions can give birth to new and unexpected ideas. 

* * * 

"A flourishing society would be one which grows along the three planes of science, religion and art under conditions of freedom."
—Subroto Roy

"There is not enough darkness in all the world to put out the light of even one small candle."

—Rober Alden

"Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose, or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation."

—Graham Greene

"More is more. Less is a bore."
—Robert Venturi

"Think twice before burdening a friend with a secret."

—Marlene Dietrich

"Men are not hanged for stealing horses, but that the horses may not be stolen."
-- The Marquis of Halifax

"Bureaucracies are far better at removing fingerprints from snafus than dusting for them."
—Mark Thompson

“The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution.”

—Hannah Arendt

 

"Almost all our misfortunes in life come from the wrong notions we have about the things that happen to us."  

—Stendhal journal entry (10 December 1801)

"Never measure the height of a mountain, until you have reached the top. Then you will see how low it was."
--Dag Hammarskjold  

"Nothing is more common than the wish to be remarkable."

—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

"When exposing a crime is treated as committing a crime, you are ruled by criminals."

—Edward Snowden

“Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.”

-–John Wooden

"I lived on books. Books taught me how to think."

--Sy Hersh

"A short saying often contains much wisdom."

—Sophocles

“Recommend virtue to your children, that alone—not wealth—can give happiness.”
— Ludwig van Beethoven

"A hot dog at the ballgame beats roast beef at the Ritz."
—Humphrey Bogart

"A day of bad writing is always better than a day of no writing."

--Don Roff

“If you can’t fly, then run, if you can’t run, then walk, if you can’t walk, then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.” 

—Martin Luther King, Jr.

——————

Blowing In The Wind: Pretty Straightforward, Isn't It? Or Is It?

Proverbial wisdom: the accumulated ethical values of ordinary people in early modern England. 

Young Bob (Illus. by the author)

Bob Dylan wrote this timeless song in 1962, the year he turned 21. It appeared on his second album, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, in 1963.

I frequently like to examine what young Dylan was doing and compare it to what was happening in the popular culture. Some of the "big hits" of 1962, when he wrote this, included The Twist (Chubby Checker), Mashed Potato Time (Dee Dee Sharp), I Can't Stop Loving You (Ray Charles), The Loco-Motion (Little Eva), and Stranger on the Shore at #1 by Acker Bilk. 

Dylan first performed a two verse version of this song at Gerde's Folk City (See Peter McKenzie's book (Bob Dylan: On A Couch & Fifty Cents A Day) for more details about this time in the young singer/songwriter's life. The date of that performance was in April, so he was still twenty.

The past few days a group of Airstreamers has been in town on a journey from the North Country here down into the deep roots of the blues, taking in the Crossroads, Memphis and other historic places from music history. One of them mentioned to me how she didn't know, like many others, that "Blowin' in the Wind" was not written by Peter, Paul & Mary.

The song has been recorded extensively by other artists including a German version by none other than Marlene Dietrich. 

Much has been written about this song through the decades and it's message never seems to grow stale. By means of a few simple questions it forcefully cuts to the root of a number of issues. 27 years later Dylan would use this same technique of asking questions in a lyrical format, except the questions are turned inward. "What good am I if I'm like all the rest, if I just turn away when I see how you're dressed?" ("What Good Am I?", Oh Mercy) This rhetorical style is repeated two tracks later in the song "What Was It You Wanted?" There's nothing ambiguous about the first, and plenty of fog, shadow and mist in the second.

Blowin' in the Wind

How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
How many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand? *
Yes, and how many times must the cannonballs fly
Before they're forever banned?

The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

Yes, and how many years must a mountain exist
Before it is washed to the sea?
And how many years can some people exist
Before they're allowed to be free?
Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head
And pretend that he just doesn't see?

The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

Yes, and how many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
And how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, and how many deaths will it take 'til he knows
That too many people have died?

The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
The answer is blowin' in the wind

© 1962 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1990 by Special Rider Music

* * * 

A lot has been written about this song. You can learn more about nearly any song on Wikipedia. The song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1994. Ten years later it held the #14 position in Rolling Stones' 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

* "And the dove came in to him at eventide; and, lo, in her mouth an olive-leaf plucked off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth." --Genesis 8:11

Related Links

A Visit with Peter McKenzie, Author of Bob Dylan: On A Couch & Fifty Cents A Day (Part One)

On Amazon: On a Counch & Fifty Cents a Day

Marlene Dietrich Quotes and Reflections

Marlene Dietrich

I first learned the backstory on how Marlene Dietrich was discovered via the book Fun in a Chinese Laundry, Josef von Sternberg's autobiography of his life in Hollywood in the first half of the last century. The title has nothing to do with Chinese laundries and everything to do with the life of an interesting director. The title is essentially Clickbait, something a forward thinking Hollywood director might think of since who wants to read an autobiography about someone that they really hadn’t known all that well.

The film that set her career on fire was von Sternberg's The Blue Angel, of which the director produced both German and English versions. Her role as Lola-Lola garnered for her a contract with Paramount and she became one of the highest paid actresses in Hollywood.

I discovered von Sternberg through a reference by Orson Welles who had the upmost respect for the Austrian-born director who was also an artist with the camera.  Welles himself gave Marlene Dietrich some limelight in his distinctively dark Touch of Evil, which critics have ranked #2 in his directorial oeuvre, a notch behind his epic Citizen Kane.

Marlene Dietrich was famous for her husky, sultry voice and seductive good looks. There was, however, more to her than meets the eyes. Though she was not a central character in Touch of Evil, she was definitely a memorable one. All her scenes packed a punch. Here's a snippet from her last dialogue with Orson Wells:

Quinlan: Come on, read my future for me.
Tanya: You haven't got any.
Quinlan: Hmm? What do you mean?
Tanya: Your future's all used up.

You could read the whole story in these four lines.

As Tanya, the fortune teller in Touch of Evil

* * * *

Here are some Marlene Dietrich quotes to bring you home.

Dietrich as the Blue Angel, Lola-Lola.  I am reminded
 of Liza Minnelli in Cabaret.

On Quotations: "I love them because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognizedly wiser than oneself."

On Forgiveness: "Once a woman has forgiven her man, she must not reheat his sins for breakfast."

"Most women set out to try to change a man, and when they have changed him they do not like him."

"America took me into her bosom when there was no longer a country worthy of the name, but in my heart I am German – German in my soul."

"The Germans and I no longer speak the same language."

Ms. Dietrich came to the U.S. during the turbulent period between the two world wars.

"The tears I have cried over Germany have dried. I have washed my face."

"The average man is more interested in a woman who is interested in him than he is in a woman with beautiful legs."

"Think twice before burdening a friend with a secret."

"Without tenderness, a man is uninteresting."

* * * *

Born in December 1901, the German-American actress passed away in May of 1992. 

Will Dylan Help You Find Direction Home?

How would you like to be together through life with Bob Dylan? I mean, when you’re driving in your car and you don’t know which way to go, you can turn on the GPS and, hey, you’ve got company. Yes, to drive beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free, sillouhetted by the sea... heading on out to Highway 61, or wherever.

Oh where have you been driving my blue-eyed son?
Oh where have you been driving my darling young one?

Dylan created a stir the other night by mentioning on his BBC radio show that he's been in discussions with not one, but two sat nav companies as a candidate to be The Voice that leads you home.

The idea isn’t so novel when you discover that other celebs have already been actively directing peoples' drives, from John Cleese and Mr. T to a Sean Connery knock-off and the real Homer Simpson. (I don’t think I want to hear a “Doh!” every time I make a wrong turn though.)

My guess is that once the novelty wears off you won’t care too much who’s chattin’ at you as long as the directions are accurate. Whenever we stopped to ask for directions in Mexico they almost always said the same thing: “Todo derecho” which literally means, “All right” but we took to mean, “Just keep going straight ahead” because that’s where they were always pointing. Which meant the directions were usually useless.

The Dylan comments seem to have created quite a buzz, though. Was it a trial balloon to see how much interest there would be in the idea? Rumor has it that six other rock stars made similar comments on the air this past two months and not one story appeared in print afterwards, proof that Dylan’s still got pull and a lot of others are still just wannabes.

Journalists are having fun with the story though. I liked this one from the London Telegraph with the subhead “For anyone lost on their way to Maggie’s Farm, this might be just the thing.”

Then there's the guy in California, Jonathan Mann, who already wrote and YouTubed a "Sneak Preview" spoof version of what the new Dylan GPS system will sound like.

Actually, this guy Mann seems pretty clever. What Julie Powell did with a year's worth of Julia Child recipes, he's attempting to do with a year's worth of songs... writing one each day, turning it into a music video and airing it on YouTube. To get exposure he's been playing off the news, and is evidently getting a following.

Side street: Several years ago when podcasting first came into its own, a woman from the Dakotas podcast a song which she recorded each day and ultimately, by month's end obtained a $900,000 recording contract from Sony. I guess when you live in the middle of nowhere, you get exposure any way you can.

Back to the main road: Dylan in the news always becomes an occasion for me to share one or more of my Dylan paintings. The two pictures on this page were taken earlier thi month using the green sillouhette background which which was a foreground for my original Dylan profile. Or vice versa.

Heading down another side street... if you could have anyone in the world giving you directions on your GPS, who would it be? I can picture my brother choosing Cary Grant. He's smooth. But there are plenty of other pretty distinctive voices out there. Jimmy Stewart might be fun. Paul McCartney. How about Marlene Dietrich? "Dahling, I believe you just missed your turn."

Disclaimer: The comment about six other rock stars was strictly fiction.