Has the world ever been changed by anything save the thought and its magic vehicle the Word?
Thomas MannSolitude gives birth to the original in us, to beauty unfamiliar and perilous - to poetry. But also, it gives birth to the opposite: to the perverse, the illicit, the absurd.
Thomas MannHe took in the squeaky music, the vulgar and pining melodies, because passion immobilizes good taste and seriously considers what soberly would be thought of as funny and to be resented.
Thomas MannForbearance in the face of fate, beauty constant under torture, are not merely passive. They are a positive achievement, an explicit triumph.
Thomas Mann