After all, nothing was more American than wielding a gun and committing oneself to die for freedom and independence, unless it was wielding that gun to take away someone else’s freedom and independence.

They cannot represent themselves; they must be represented. Marx spoke of the oppressed class that was not politically conscious enough to see itself as a class, but was anything ever more true of the dead, as well as the extras?

Although every country thought itself superior in its own way, was there ever a country that coined so many “super” terms from the federal bank of its narcissism,

If youth was not wasted, how could it be youth?

You are a good student, as all Orientals are. Despite myself, I felt a small surge of pride. Like all good students, I yearned for nothing but approval, even from fools.

If something is worth dying for, then you’ve got a reason to live.

No surprise, then, that sometimes I dreamed of trying to pull a mask off my face, only to realize that the mask was my face.

the other motive, love,

happiness, American style, is a zero-sum game,