Thursday, July 8, 2010

Quotes: Small Town (6)

 Small town     257         [Small American town]: "It is an unimaginatively standardized background, a sluggishness of speech and manners, a rigid ruling of the spirit by the desire to be respectable …contentment…the contentment of the quiet dead, who are scornful of the living for their restless walking…a negation canonized as the one positive virtue…the prohibition of happiness…dullness made God." Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.

Small town     258         [American small town]: "A savorless people, gulping tasteless food, and sitting afterward, coatless and thoughtless, in rocking chairs…listening to mechanical music, saying mechanical things about the excellence of Ford automobiles…." Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.

Small town     259         "The cloud of serene ignorance submerges them in unhappiness and futility." Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.

Small town     261         "…Carol saw the fact that the prairie towns no more exist to serve the farmers who are their reason of existence than do the great capitals; they exist to fatten on the farmers, to provide for the townsmen large motors and social preferment…." Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.

Small town     275         "The incredible dullness of it all…they don’t know what they miss…anybody can endure anything; look at men in mines and in prisons." Sinclair Lewis, Main Street.

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