Camille Paglia Quotes Page 2
Best 90 Quotes by Camille Paglia – Page 2 of 3
“Television is actually closer to reality than anything in books. The madness of TV is the madness of human life.”
“The altar, as in pre-history, is anywhere you kneel.”
“The Earth is littered with the ruins of empires that believed they were eternal.”
“The fact is, you get great art only from mutilated egos. Only mutilated egos are obsessive enough.”
“The feminist line is, strippers and topless dancers are degraded, subordinated, and enslaved; they are victims, turned into objects by the display of their anatomy. But women are far from being victims — women rule; they are in total control … the feminist analysis of prostitution says that men are using money as power over women. I'd say, yes, that's all that men have. The money is a confession of weakness. They have to buy women's attention. It's not a sign of power; it's a sign of weakness.”
“The idea that intelligence can be gauged by an IQ test is erroneous.”
“The male orientation of classical Athens was inseparable from its genius. Athens became great not despite but because of its misogyny.”
“The prostitute is not, as feminists claim, the victim of men, but rather their conqueror, an outlaw, who controls the sexual channels between nature and culture.”
“We cannot have a world where everyone is a victim. "I'm this way because my father made me this way. I'm this way because my husband made me this way." Yes, we are indeed formed by traumas that happen to us. But then you must take charge, you must take over, you are responsible.”
“We must accept our pain, change what we can and laugh at the rest.”
“When feminist discourse is unable to discriminate the drunken fraternity brother from the homicidal maniac, women are in trouble.”
“When I meet gay men anywhere in the world, there is a spontaneity and a spirit of fun and mischief that lesbians seem incapable of.”
“Woman is the dominant sex. Men have to do all sorts of stuff to prove that they are worthy of woman's attention.”
“You have to accept the fact that part of the sizzle of sex comes from the danger of sex. You can be overpowered.”
Break, Blow, Burn Quotes
“Criticism at its best is re-creative, not spirit-killing.”
“Love is imploring humanity: Set down your burden of doubt; in perfect faith there is neither fear nor struggle.”
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“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it's not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That's why it's your path.”
“The only antidote to the magic of images is the magic of words.”
Sex, Art and American Culture Quotes
“A woman simply is, but a man must become. Masculinity is risky and elusive. It is achieved by a revolt from woman, and it is confirmed only by other men.”
“Feminism was always wrong to pretend that women could 'have it all'. It is not male society but mother nature who lays the heaviest burden on woman.”
“Incompetent amateurs have given prostitution a bad name.”
“When in doubt, I read Oscar Wilde.”
“When women cut themselves off from men, they sink backward into psychological and spiritual stagnancy.”
“Women will never be taken seriously until they accept full responsibility for their sexuality.”
Sexual Personae Quotes
“All roads from Rousseau lead to Sade.”
“All the genres of philosophy, science, high art, athletics and politics were invented by men. But by the Promethean law of conflict and capture, woman has a right to seize what she will and vie with man on her own terms.”
“An erection is a thought and the org*sm an act of the imagination. The male has to will his sexual authority before the woman who is a shadow of his mother and of all women. Failure and humiliation constantly wait in the wings. No woman has to prove herself a woman in the grim way a man has to prove himself a man. He must perform, or the show does not go on. Social convention is irrelevant. A flop is a flop.”
“At some level, all love is combat, a wrestling with ghosts.”
“Beauty is our escape from the murky flesh-envelope that imprisons us.”
“Capitalism is an art form.”
“Each generation drives its plow over the bones of the dead.”
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“We have inherited a fear of memories of slavery. It is as if to remember and acknowledge slavery would amount to our being consumed by it. As a matter of fact, in the popular black imagination, it is easier for us to construct ourselves as children of Africa, as the sons and daughters of kings and queens, and thereby ignore the Middle Passage and centuries of enforced servitude in the Americas. Although some of us might indeed be the descendants of African royalty, most of us are probably descendants of their subjects, the daughters and sons of African peasants or workers.”