Jonathan Franzen

United States
Born on 17 Aug 1959
Novelist/Essayist

What We Are About

I think the iPod is the true face of Republican politics, and I�m in favor of the music industry - standing up proud and saying it out loud: We in the Chiclet-manufacturing business are not about social justice, ...we�re not about a coherent set of national ideals, we�re not about wisdom. We�re about choosing what WE want to listen to and ignoring everything else. ...We�re about giving ourselves a mindless feel-good treat every five minutes. ...We�re about persuading ten-year-old children to spend twenty-five dollars on a cool little silicone iPod case that costs a licensed Apple Computer subsidiary thirty-nine cents to manufacture.

Jonathan Franzen, in 'Freedom'
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Freedom

Jonathan Franzen

 

On Anger: "For every minute you remain angry, you give up sixty seconds of peace of mind."
Essays
On Destiny: "Our destiny exercises its influence over us even when, as yet, we have not learned its nature: it is our future that lays down the law of our today."
Human, All Too Human
On Friendship: "A crowd is not company; and faces are but a gallery of pictures; and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love."
Essays