Quotes for the present
Columnist Garrison Keillor’s flowery prose about cheerfulness of purpose rings hollow in these uncertain times.
In “September: Time to lighten up and get a grip” (Commentary, Sept. 26), he exalted the flowery Emerson and gave Thoreau a pan.
Keillor quoted Emerson saying, “Every great and commanding moment in the annals of the world is the triumph of some enthusiasm.”
Can it also be said that the many atrocities that have occurred throughout history were done without enthusiasm?
“Lighten up,” Keillor says. “Get a grip . . . We have passed the great test of a republic, to survive the most incompetent leadership . . . “
It’s quite obvious that it is too soon to say that we have survived: George W. Bush is still in the White House, our troops are still in Iraq, millions of Americans are one major illness away from bankruptcy and our entire economy is swimming on a bubble of red ink.
If we are indeed passing this great test of our republic, we are doing so by cheating.
Iraqis (1 million killed by some estimates, and 4 million refugees) have paid dearly for America’s education, beginning with sanctions that killed half-a-million innocent children and ending with this bloody, oily mess that has been made of their country.
To paraphrase Dickens, it is the best of times and the worst of times — which one, of course, depends upon where you are and what you are willing to ignore.
Harold Williamson
Wheeling
Delightful reading
I am a big fan of Garrison Keillor’s writings in the Tribune. I find it refreshing to read someone who is simultaneously witty, sarcastic, intelligent, insightful, educated and, above all, eloquent. Whenever I read the words of Garrison Keillor, they leap off of the page and paint a vivid picture that I feel I can almost touch. That quality alone, regardless of whether or not I agree with what he has to say, makes his writings such a delight to read.
John Videll
Chicago
