(no subject)

Aiken on his friendship with Eliot:

We developed a shorthand language of our own which we fell into for the rest of our lives whenever we met, no holds barred--all a matter of past reference, a common language, but basically affection, along with humor, and appreciation of each other's minds, and of Krazy Kat.

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(no subject)

Borges interviewed:

We saw the Russian Revolution as a sort of beginning for peace among all men. My father was an anarchist, a Spencerian, a reader of The Man Versus the State, and I recall that in one of the long summer vacations we took in Montevideo, my father told me to take a good look at many things because those things were going to disappear and I would be able to tell my children or grandchildren--I haven't had any children or grandchildren--that I had seen those things. He told me to look at military barracks, flags, maps having different colors for the different countries, butcher shops, churches, priests, custom houses, because all of those things were going to disappear when the world was one and differences were forgotten. Up until now the prophecy hasn't come true, but I hope it will come true some day.

Unrelated sentence from later in the same book:

I believe no one thinks his own behavior is exemplary.