Wendell Berry
Wendell Berry
Wendell E. Berryis an American novelist, poet, environmental activist, cultural critic, and farmer. A prolific author, he has written many novels, short stories, poems, and essays. He is an elected member of the Fellowship of Southern Writers, a recipient of The National Humanities Medal, and the Jefferson Lecturer for 2012. He is also a 2013 Fellow of The American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Berry was named the recipient of the 2013 Richard C. Holbrooke Distinguished Achievement Award. On January...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth5 August 1934
CityHenry County, KY
CountryUnited States of America
war development world
This massive ascendancy of corporate power over democratic process is probably the most ominous development since the end of World War II, and for the most part "the free world" seems to be regarding it as merely normal.
war heart terrible
To hear of a thousand deaths in war is terrible, and we 'know' that it is. But as it registers on our hearts, it is not more terrible than one death fully imagined.
war men mind
Far from making peace, wars invariably serve as classrooms and laboratories where men and techniques and states of mind are prepared for the next war.
war dark winter
In the dark of the moon, in flying snow, in the dead of winter, war spreading, families dying, the world in danger, I walk the rocky hillside, sowing clover.
war atrocities-committed asking
Supporters of the war are constantly asking those who oppose it: Why don't you deplore the wrongs and atrocities committed by the other side? The answer, so far as I am concerned, is that I do deplore the wrongs and atrocities committed by the other side. But I am responsible for the wrongs and atrocities committed by our side. And I am no longer able to participate in the assumption that atrocities committed by remote control are less objectionable than those committed at arm's length. I am most concerned with American obstacles to peace because I am an American.
war differences risk
How would you describe the difference between modern war and modern industry-between say, bombing and strip mining, or between chemical warfare and chemical manufacturing? The difference seems to be only that in war the victimization of humans is directly intentional and in industry it is "accepted" as a "trade-off." Were the catastrophes of Love Canal, Bhopal, Chernobyl, and the Exxon Valdez episodes of war or of peace? They were in fact, peacetime acts of aggression, intentional to the extent that the risks were known and ignored.
war people enemy
This new war, like the previous one, would be a test of the power of machines against people and places; whatever its causes and justifications, it would make the world worse. This was true of that new war, and it has been true of every new war since... I knew too that this new war was not even new but was only the old one come again. And what caused it? It was caused, I thought, by people failing to love one another, failing to love their enemies.
war needs excess
We do need a 'new economy,' but one that is founded on thrift and care, on saving and conserving, not on excess and waste. An economy based on waste is inherently and hopelessly violent, and war is its inevitable by-product. We need a peaceable economy.
warfare economy candor
Let us have the candor to acknowledge that what we call "the economy" or "the free market" is less and less distinguishable from warfare.
christian war feelings
One cannot be aware both of the history of Christian war and of the contents of the gospels without feeling that something is amiss.
war serious prepared
If we are serious about peace, then we must work for it as ardently, seriously, continuously, carefully, and bravely as we have ever prepared for war.
war sacrifice people
The most alarming sign of the state of our society now is that our leaders have the courage to sacrifice the lives of young people in war but have not the courage to tell us that we must be less greedy and wasteful.
arms circle ear enter except fragments hands hears joined larger move music passing subtle vast whose
We clasp the hands of those that go before us, And the hands of those who come after us. We enter the little circle of each other's arms And the larger circle of lovers, Whose hands are joined in a dance, And the larger circle of all creatures, Passing in and out of life, Who move also in a dance, To a music so subtle and vast that no ear hears it Except in fragments
adding bad escape good past
The past is our definition. We may strive, with good reason, to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it, but we will escape it only by adding something better to it.