Sherry Chandler » Frye on The East
Frye on The East
If there is any spot in the world where reason had a clear field it’s India; & the whole set-up in China is — or rather was — an enlightened liberal Deism which makes our 18th century look like what it was — cheap chinoiserie…The one unique thing about the West is its inability to perceive its lack of uniqueness, its dogma of peculiarity, its belief that God planned a high road for the West, with the Greeks contributing reason, Hebrews moral virtue, Romans law, English liberty, & Americans atomic bombs and sanitary napkins, & the East to rotate helplesly around its own navel until rescued by the West. The fact that the bloody world is round is one of the first things we learn & one of the last we ever believe.
— from Northrop Fry Unbuttoned. Wit and Wisdom from the Notebooks and Diaries (Gnomon, 2004)
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