Red Plenty
Metadata
- Author: Francis Spufford
- ASIN: B0044DEFSC
- ISBN: 0571225233
- Reference: https://amazon.co.uk/dp/B0044DEFSC
- Kindle link
Highlights
‘Do not worry, my soul,’ said the wise wife. ‘Go to sleep. The morning is wiser than the evening.’ — location: 1920
To be one of the lucky few who could read about the world outside therefore gave you a responsibility to try and do something about Russia; usually not in a directly political way, unless you were one of those with a very pronounced bump of idealism, but by building up an alternative Russia in culture, in novels and poetry and art where stupidity was not enthroned. Above all, to be an intellectual was to feel that you were, at least potentially, one of those who spoke truth to power. By teaching and learning at all, reading and writing at all, you were implicitly acting as a witness, as a prophet of a larger life. — location: 1935