November 15, 2016
One of our brightest, most honorable journalists died yesterday at age 61 from cancer. Gwen Ifill leaves a gaping hole in the current media landscape at a time when she and her smart analyses were most needed. I think she would have wanted us to move forward and so the American (and German) voices about moving forwards are dedicated to her. The citations brighten my horizon because I feel I’m in good and diverse company even when it seems that time is going backwards. (I photographed the tiled images in the NYT subway system.)
If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values — that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.
—Martin Luther King, Jr.
Let us not look back in anger or forward in fear, but around in awareness
—James Thurber
The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith.—Franklin D. Roosevelt
I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world, not only for its strength, but for its civilization as well. And I look forward to a world in which we will be safe not only for democracy and diversity but also for personal distinction.
—John F. Kennedy, speech at Amherst College, October 26, 1963
I do the very best I can to look upon life with optimism and hope and looking forward to a better day, but I don’t think there is anything such as complete happiness. It pains me that there is still a lot of Klan activity and racism. I think when you say you’re happy, you have everything that you need and everything that you want, and nothing more to wish for. I haven’t reached that stage yet.
—Rosa Parks
Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Martha Ullman West
Perfection, Friderike, all of it. Where in the NY subway by the way did you photograph those tiles?
Renate Funk
Thank you, Friderike. This post is such a thoughtful comfort. I like the James Thurber quote in particular.
Steve Tilden
Thank you for another excellent missive. We are indeed walking a tight-rope; the next four years will probably sorely challenge our collective patience and capacity for forgiveness. I’m reading Forsyth’s autobiography, many harrowing experiences, but the worst so far are his months working for Reuters living in East Berlin. He actually met in a bar an old man who was a Nazi prison guard, who told him killing was easy. There are people, men and women, in this world who would gladly drown a baby if they saw it as an enemy. Steve Bannon is likely of that ilk.
Those images from the subway are very good . . .
Eric Brody
Your daily missives are always thought provoking. Loss is a constant in our lives, but for some reason, perhaps age, recent losses have affected me more so than those in the past. In the past month I have lost, to cancer, my cousin, the closest person to me in my family, the sister I never had. Now, with the loss of Leonard Cohen, albeit at 82, a decently long life, I guess, and of Gwen Ifil, at 61, younger than I, to say nothing of the cataclysmic political scene, I feel genuinely depressed and sad for our world. Clearly family loss is different than “celebrity” loss but these were all people who affected me in many important ways. Thanks Friderike for making us think and for reminding us of the important things in our lives.
Gloria
Yet again, thanks, Fri. Magnificent images and important to summon hope so as to be able to act, though still way too hard yet.