An old quote, given my threads on formal logic vs chaotic approach to knowledge, from The Secret History by Donna Tartt (p.28) :
I was charmed by his conversation, and despite its illusion of being rather modern and digressive (to me, the hallmark of the modern mind is that it loves to wander from the subject) I now see that he was leading me by circumlocution to the same points again and again. For if the modern mind is whimsical and discursive, the classical mind is narrow, unhesitating, relentless. It is not a quality of intelligence that one encounters frequently these days. But though I can digress with the best of them, I am nothing in my soul if not obsessive.”
A direct copy of a post from way back in 2001 – but deleted to avoid a weird amount of spam traffic on the original post title. Nothing if not obsessive.
(Nope – update – marking as deleted, deleting the content and changing the title hasn’t stopped the spam hits, so these are not new search hits on the text, but must be externally indexed links to the permalink – so now hard-deleted. And – update – that appears to have worked – so I can leave this post to rest in peace.)
Donna Tartt a recurring input to my Amor Vincit Omnia thread.