Quotes from Philipp Blom

No dictatorship has ever approved of jazz.

The irony at the base of this situation is that the gospel of the free market is just as ideological as those of communism and fascism.

Close dancing may be the best inoculation against ideology.

Nietzsche's subtle, poetic, and entirely unsystemic attacks on academic style and thinking were predestined to be quoted out of context, and his pithy and often sarcastic observations could be put in the service of a wider assault on rationality itself.

They could simply not accept that there might be no God, precisely because that would mean that life was not inherently meaningful. In their heart of hearts they were unwilling to confront the possibility that they themselves, the vast universe of every individual consciousness, could be as meaningless and as random as a leaf whirled into the air by a gust of wind. The

Spin doctors in every era have known that perception is infinitely more potent than mere fact.

Some 110,000 witch trials occurred at this time in Europe, roughly half of them ending in conviction and execution

Cursed be he by day and cursed be he by night; cursed be he when he lies down and cursed be he when he rises up. Cursed be he when he goes out and cursed be he when he comes in.

any attachment bears within it the tragedy of loss.

Instead of extinguishing in the heart of men the essential and natural love for themselves, morality should use it to show them the interest in being good, human, sociable, and trustworthy: far from wanting to destroy the passions inherent in his nature, morality will lead him to virtue, without which no man on earth can ever enjoy true happiness.

In other words, it makes no difference whether one believes in God. As there is no way of proving or disproving the object of this belief, it remains a personal choice, much like a preference for a particular dish or for strong coffee. You may believe what you want, as long as it helps you live. This