Joy

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 244 of 299 · 20 per page

• From Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (1989)

  This membership is acknowleged in the recognition, th e gratitude of future generations towards the lonely fighters of today. And so correlative to the sense of obligation to work for this fulfilled humanity (so hard to understand purely on grounds of the harmony of interests) is an expectation of fame and gratitude from our posterity. The community of interest which is not there on the level of concrete human fulfilments, between me and the happy future communit y for which I sacrifice my present well-being, is restored on the level of the meaning of our lives, by their recognition of my signal contribution to what they have all come to define as what makes human life significant. And so it is not surprising that posterity is repeatedl y evoked by the Aufklarer. Its recognition is their great consolation. Their posthumous fame w as their immortality. 5 7 Diderot invoked i t constantly. In his later years, he wrote his most penetrating works entirely for readers of the future, and didn,t even try to publish them in his lifetime. In his Refutation of Helvetius, de /'Homme, just after the passage I quoted above, in which he shows how absurd it is to explain the heroism of contemporary philosophes in terms of physical pleasure, Diderot formulates what he thinks their real motivation is: Ils se flattent qu'un jour on les nommera , et que leur memoire ser a eternellement honoree parmi les hommes ... Ils jouissent d'avance de l a douce melodie de ce concert lointain de voix a venir et occupees a les celebrer, et leur coeur en tresaille de joie. They flatter themselves that one day we will acclaim them, and that th eir memory will be forever honoured among men ... They rejoice in advance in the sweet melody of the distant concert of voices, which will come to celebrate them, and their heart quivers with joy.

• From Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (1989)

  It all ends up as something unspeak ably ba n al and ordinary, however lofty the dream. The goal seems to be to depict quite unremittingly the tawdriness of the mediocre. The power of the work as art lies in its extraordina ry ability to captur e this banality, where th e almost irr e sistible drift o f the inherited modes of representation had b een to enhance or idealize. But wh y does this move either the writer or the reader? Not just as a tour de force, but in the sense of power and freedom from this banality which is inseparable from the capturing of it as an object of c ontemplation. The re is a kind of tran sfi gu r ation her e; not the kind whic h rev eals mean i ng, b ut rathe r th at which gi ves the meaning le s s and ba nal unh appiness t he clos ur e and shape of fate. Ch arl es Rose n and Henri Zerner, in th eir int eresti n g b ook on rea lism and Ro mant ic i s m, spe ak of the " det erminism " of Ba udelai re , whic h "a llow s th e facts to spea k for themsel v es wit h o ut com men t: the ine vitablity is an aes th etic qu ality. It is n ot me rely a su bstitut e for b eauty , but is to be consi der ed absolutely beautiful in itself" . 3 5 So the unveiling of things in their meaninglessness involves its o wn kind of transfiguration. The joy we take in this has something t o do with our own p ower t o confront the truth and acknowledge it; and this power crucially d epends on the c losure which makes t he entrapment in banality and emptiness a kind of fate which we can contemp l ate. It is being able to 4 32 • SUBTLER LANGUAGES contemplate it which fr ees us from the entrapment, and t his freedom is the condition of the sense of power and joy. Realist art relies on its own form of transfiguration in stripping things o f meaning. It is a kind of transfiguration which tends to exalt more the creative p ower of the artist. But realism contains more than this. Not all of it was so r esolutely counter-epiphanic. There was another strand in which something does afte r all shine through the subject.

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  He swims over to my rock and climbs up. Slowly, passionately, he kisses me and then licks every part of my body, one by one. I can barely stand it when his tongue wiggles its way up my thighs to my vagina where he meticulously traces the shape of each lip, circling the opening and then kissing my clit until I’m writhing in ecstasy. He lies down beside me and soon we make joyous love. First he is on top of me, then I’m on top of him. We are free, incredibly sensuous and tender. Afterward I quietly swim off as he sleeps. I glance back for one last look at his moist body glistening in the sun. Arlene’s fantasy is quintessential “high romance,” far more common among women than men. I’ve often noticed that women frequently make a point of sketching out dreamy settings, sometimes concentrating their attention on the environment as much as or more than on sexual specifics. When a man describes idyllic fantasies, with rare exceptions he emphasizes the perfection of his partner’s body, usually with little or no interest in the environment, except as a setup for great sex. Like Arlene, Luke enthusiastically dwells on the exquisite beauty of his ideal fantasy lover. The ambiance, though, is notably different: I’m at home in my apartment watching TV in my gym shorts when the doorbell rings. I can’t believe my eyes when a gorgeous fox is standing there. She’s my new neighbor and just stopped by to say hello. I eagerly invite her in. She’s drop-dead gorgeous in a silky nightgown that reveals every curve. Her waist is narrow, her hips wide and shapely. I watch her ass sway as she walks to my sofa. Long, auburn hair swoops down, partially covering the milky skin of her cleavage. I can’t help staring at nipples which show clearly through her gown. I’m fumbling for words when she slides closer to me and plays with my chest and stomach with her long fingernails. I pull her closer still as she grabs my dick. I feel a shiver go through her body. I invite her to the bedroom and lift the gown over her head, revealing an even more incredible body than I expected. She rips off my shorts and we fall into bed, fucking with uncontrollable abandon. She loves it when I plunge into her juicy pussy. Before I know it she’s coming wildly, screaming. Her reaction turns me on so much that I thrust faster and faster, coming, coming until I collapse on top of her, spent. After I calm down, I watch her slip into her gown, shake out her hair, and walk toward the door. “See ya later, neighbor,” she whispers as the door closes behind her.

• From The Pisces (2018)

  I was wearing terrible, grandmotherly cotton underpants. He breathed on my pussy through the fabric and it felt warm and wet. Then he licked the skin on the sides of my undies, kissing back into the center and out again, moaning with his warm mouth open on the fabric. He pulled my underpants to one side and gave me a long lick, starting with my hole and slowly tracing over my clit. He did this again, back and forth, bringing the moisture from inside me over my clit. I was shaking. I looked up at the sky. It felt so good, but I was nervous. “Theo,” I said. “It might take me a little while. Is that okay? Will you tell me if you get tired?” He took his head out from under my skirt. “I want you to take as long as you need,” he said. “Take the whole night. Take forever.” I lay back down. The stars were beautiful but I closed my eyes. I focused on the feeling in my pussy entirely and not what was going on around us or even him. It was a sustained goodness and I felt that in my sexual relationships with others I had missed the point. Had it ever been solely about pleasure for me? Maybe I had missed the point of what having a pussy was for entirely. It was not for having babies or pissing, but simply a locus of pleasure—its own purpose. Now a growing confidence was there, like a crystal inside it or maybe a whole ocean. Perhaps the crystal had always been there without me seeing or knowing. Had I always glowed from there but never realized? Right above my pussy, my whole pelvis felt full—not of piss or pain—but self-sustaining, pulsing. I felt glad to be alive. Or not even glad, just alive. I was in my is-ness and was not going to fight it. So this was joy. Like my pussy, this part of my pelvis felt like it had existed forever but had disappeared years ago. I remembered feeling something like this as a young child, but somehow that feeling had been eclipsed and forgotten until now. It had been eclipsed by all the matter on Earth. I saw that all of that matter was just emptiness. It accrued and accrued to nothing. My chest, too, was warm, as though it sought to open, like a light in there was pushing through rusty doors. This I resisted. I was scared, afraid to let the doors swing open fully. But my throat felt like the throat I had known as a child, when all language was new and words hadn’t hurt so much. In the past when I made sex sounds, I tried to imitate what I saw in porn. But now what I heard was way deeper, guttural, without the formation of my mouth. It didn’t resemble syllables and definitely not words. It was the sound of the planet rotating.

• From The Strange Order of Things: Life, Feeling, and the Making of Cultures (2018)

  Desire and lust, caring and nurturing, attachment and love, operate in a social context. The same applies to most instances of joy and sadness, fear and panic, anger; or of compassion, admiration and awe, envy and jealousy and contempt. The powerful sociality that was an essential support of the intellect of Homo sapiens and was so critical in the emergence of cultures is likely to have originated in the machinery of drives, motivations, and emotions, where it evolved from simpler neural processes of simpler creatures. Even further back in time, it evolved from an army of chemical molecules, some of which were present in unicellular organisms. The point to be made here is that sociality, a collection of behavioral strategies indispensable for the creation of cultural responses, is part of the tool kit of homeostasis. Sociality enters the human cultural mind by the hand of affect. 10 — The behavioral and neural aspects of drives and motivations have been especially well studied by Jaak Panksepp and Kent Berridge in mammals. Anticipation and desire, which Panksepp subsumes under the label of “seeking” and Berridge prefers to call “wanting,” are prominent examples. So is lust, both in its plain sex-related variety and in romantic love. The care and nurturing of progeny is another powerful drive complemented, on the side of those who are nurtured and cared for, by bonds of attachment and love, the sorts of bonds whose interruptions lead to panic and grief. Play is prominent in mammals and birds and is central to human life. Play anchors the creative imagination of children, adolescents, and adults and is a critical ingredient of the inventions that hallmark cultures. 11 — In conclusion, most images that enter our minds are entitled to an emotive response, strong or weak. The origin of the image does not matter. Any sensory process can constitute a trigger, from taste and olfaction to vision, and it does not really matter whether the image is being freshly minted in perception or recalled from the stores of memory. It does not matter if the image pertains to animate or inanimate objects, to features of objects—colors, shapes, the timbres of sounds—to actions, abstractions, or judgments on any of the above. A predictable consequence of processing many images that flow in our minds is an emotive response followed by its respective feeling. Thus provoked, emotional feelings are not quite about listening to the background music of life. Emotional feelings are about hearing occasional songs and sometimes full-regalia opera arias. The pieces are still executed by the same ensembles, in the same hall—the body—and against the same background: life.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  Father read aloud from Dickens, and I was in seventh heaven, since I was sitting on Father’s chair, close to Peter. I went downstairs at quarter to eleven. When I went back up at eleven-thirty, Peter was already waiting for me on the stairs. We talked until quarter to one. Whenever I leave the room, for example after a meal, and Peter has a chance and no one else can hear, he says, “Bye, Anne, see you later.” Oh, I’m so happy! I wonder if he’s going to fall in love with me after all? In any case, he’s a nice boy, and you have no idea how good it is to talk to him! Mrs. van D. thinks it’s all right for me to talk to Peter, but today she asked me teasingly, “Can I trust you two up there?” “Of course,” I protested. “I take that as an insult!” Morning, noon and night, I look forward to seeing Peter. Yours, Anne M. Frank PS. Before I forget, last night everything was blanketed in snow. Now it’s thawed and there’s almost nothing left. MONDAY, MARCH 6, 1944 Dearest Kitty, Ever since Peter told me about his parents, I’ve felt a certain sense of responsibthty toward him-don’t you think that’s strange? It’s as though their quarrels were just as much my business as his, and yet I don’t dare bring it up anymore, because I’m afraid it makes him uncomfortable. I wouldn’t want to intrude, not for all the money in the world. I can tell by Peter’s face that he ponders things just as deeply as I do. Last night I was annoyed when Mrs. van D. scoffed, “The thinker!” Peter flushed and looked embarrassed, and I nearly blew my top. Why don’t these people keep their mouths shut? You can’t imagine what it’s like to have to stand on the sidelines and see how lonely he is, without being able to do anything. I can imagine, as if I were in his place, how despondent he must sometimes feel at the quarrels. And about love. Poor Peter, he needs to be loved so much! It sounded so cold when he said he didn’t need any friends. Oh, he’s so wrong! I don’t think he means it. He clings to his masculinity, his solitude and his feigned indifference so he can maintain his role, so he’ll never, ever have to show his feelings. Poor Peter, how long can he keep it up? Won’t he explode from this superhuman effort? Oh, Peter, if only I could help you, if only you would let me! Together we could banish our loneliness, yours and mine! I’ve been doing a great deal of thinking, but not saying much. I’m happy when I see him, and happier still if the sun shines when we’re together. I washed my hair yesterday, and because I knew he was next door, I was very rambunctious.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  But the symbol will often give us the emotional effect of the perception. Such expressions as the abysmal vault of heaven, the endless expanse of ocean, etc., summarize many computations to the imagination, and give the sense of an enormous horizon. So it seems with the blind. They multiply mentally the amount of a distinctly felt freedom to move, anti gain the immediate sense of a vaster freedom still. Thus it is that blind men are never without the consciousness of their horizon. They all enjoy travelling, especially with a companion. On the prairies the feel the great openness; in valleys they feel closed in; and one has told me that he thought few seeing people could enjoy the view from a mountain-top more than he. A blind person on entering a house or room immediately receives, from the reverberations of his voice and steps, an impression of its dimensions, and to a certain extent of its arrangement. The tympanic sense noticed on p. 140, supra, comes in to help here, and possibly other forms of tactile sensibility not yet understood. Mr. Hank Levy, the blind author of 'Blindness and the Blind' (London), gives the following account of his powers of perception:

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  As far as these ingredients of the subtler emotions go, then, the latter form no exception to our account, but rather an additional illustration thereof. In all cases of intellectual or moral rapture we find that, unless there be coupled a bodily reverberation of some kind with the mere thought of the object and cognition of its quality; unless we actually laugh at the neatness of the demonstration or witticism; unless we thrill at the case of justice, or tingle at the act of magnanimity; our state of mind can hardly be called emotional at all. It is in fact a mere intellectual perception of how certain things are to be called—neat, right, witty, generous, and the like. Such a judicial state of mind as this is to be classed among awarenesses of truth; it is a cognitive act. As a matter of fact, however, the moral and intellectual cognitions hardly ever do exist thus unaccompanied. The bodily sounding-board is at work, as careful introspection will show, far more than we usually suppose. Still, where long familiarity with a certain class of effects, even æsthetic ones, has blunted mere emotional excitability as much as it has sharpened taste and judgment, we do get the intellectual emotion, if such it can be called, pure and undefiled. And the dryness of it, the paleness, the absence of all glow, as it may exist in a thoroughly expert critic's mind, not only shows us what an altogether different thing it is from the 'coarser' emotions we considered first, but makes us suspect that almost the entire difference lies in the fact that the bodily sounding-board, vibrating in the one case, is in the other mute. "Not so very bad" is, in a person of consummate taste, apt to be the highest limit of approving expression. "Rien ne me choque" is said to have been Chopin's superlative of praise of new music. A sentimental layman would feel, and ought to feel, horrified, on being admitted into such a, critic's mind, to see how cold, how thin, how void of human significance, are the motives for favor or disfavor that there prevail. The capacity to make a nice spot on the wall will outweigh a picture's whole content; a foolish trick of words will preserve a poem; an utterly meaningless fitness of sequence in one musical composition set at naught any amount of 'expressiveness' in another.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  "That the big dog in raising the latch did not in the least know that the latch closed the gate, that the raising of the same opened it, but that he merely repeated the automatic blow with his snout which had once had such happy consequences, transpires from the following: the gate leading to the barn is fastened with a latch precisely like the one on the garden-gate, only placed a little higher, still easily within the dog's reach. Here, too, occasionally the little dog is confined, and when he barks the big one makes every possible effort to open the gate, hut it has never occurred to him to push the latch up. The brute cannot draw conclusions, that is, he cannot think."[354] In the human child, however, these ruptures of contiguous association are very soon made; far off cases of sign-using arise when we make a sign now; and soon language is launched. The child in each case makes the discovery for himself. No one can help him except by furnishing him with the conditions. But as he is constituted, the conditions will sooner or later shoot together into the result.[355] The exceedingly interesting account which Dr, Rowe gives of the education of his various blind-deaf mutes illustrates this point admirably. He began to teach Laura Bridgman by gumming raised letters on various familiar articles. The child was taught by mere contiguity to pick out a certain number of particular articles when made to feel the letters. But this was merely a collection of particular signs, out of the mass of which the general purpose of signification had not yet been extracted by the child's mind. Dr. Howe compares his situation at this moment to that of one lowering a line to the bottom of the deep sea in which Laura's soul lay, and waiting until she should spontaneously take hold of it and be raised into the light. The moment came, 'accompanied by a radiant hash of intelligence and glow of joy'; she seemed suddenly to become aware of the general purpose imbedded in the different details of all these signs, and from that moment her education went on with extreme rapidity. Another of the great capacities in which man has been said to differ fundamentally from the animal is that of possessing self-consciousness or reflective knowledge of himself as a thinker. But this capacity also flows from our criterion, for (without going into the matter very deeply) we may say that the brute never reflects on himself as a thinker, because he has never clearly dissociated, in the full concrete act of thought, the element of the thing thought of and the operation by which he thinks it. They remain always fused, conglomerated—just as the interjectional vocal sign of the brute almost invariably merges in his mind with the thing signified, and is not independently attended to in se.[356]

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  I sat up again after about five minutes, but before long he took my head in his hands and put it back next to his. Oh, it was so wonderful. I could hardly talk, my pleasure was too intense; he caressed my cheek and arm, a bit clumsily, and played with my hair. Most of the time our heads were touching. I can’t tell you, Kitty, the feeling that ran through me. I was too happy for words, and I think he was too. At nine-thirty we stood up. Peter put on his tennis shoes so he wouldn’t make much noise on his nightly round of the building, and I was standing next to him. How I suddenly made the right movement, I don’t know, but before we went downstairs, he gave me a. kiss, through my hair, half on my left cheek and half on my ear. I tore downstairs without looking back, and I long so much for today. Sunday morning, just before eleven. Yours, Anne M. Frank MONDAY, APRIL 17, 1944 Dearest Kitty, Do you think Father and Mother would approve of a girl my age sitting on a divan and kissing a seventeen-anda-half-year-old boy? I doubt they would, but I have to trust my own judgment in this matter. It’s so peaceful and safe, lying in his arms and dreaming, it’s so thrilling to feel his cheek against mine, it’s so wonderful to know there’s someone waiting for me. But, and there is a but, will Peter want to leave it at that? I haven’t forgotten his promise, but. . . he is a boy! I know I’m starting at a very young age. Not even fifteen and already so independent -- that’s a little hard for other people to understand. I’m pretty sure Margot would never kiss a boy unless there was some talk of an engagement or marriage. Neither Peter nor I has any such plans. I’m also sure that Mother never touched a man before she met Father. What would my girlfriends or Jacque say if they knew I’d lain in Peter’s arms with my heart against his chest, my head on his shoulder and his head and face against mine! Oh, Anne, how terribly shocking! But seriously, I don’t think it’s at all shocking; we’re cooped up here, cut off from the world, anxious and fearful, especially lately. Why should we stay apart when we love each other? Why shouldn’t we kiss each other in times like these? Why should we wait until we’ve reached a suitable age? Why should we ask anybody’s permission? I’ve decided to look out for my own interests. He’d never want to hurt me or make me unhappy. Why shouldn’t I do what my heart tells me and makes both of us happy? Yet I have a feeling, Kitty, that you can sense my doubt. It must be my honesty rising in revolt against all this sneaking around.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  When I was twelve and a half, I learned some more from Jacque, who wasn’t as ignorant as I was. My own intuition told me what a man and a woman do when they’re together; it seemed like a crazy idea at first, but when Jacque confirmed it, I was proud of myself for having figured it out! It was also Jacque who told me that children didn’t come out of their mother’s tummies. As she put it, “Where the ingredients go in is where the finished product comes out!” Jacque and I found out about the hymen, and quite a few other details, from a book on sex education. I also knew that you could keep from having children, but how that worked inside your body remained a mystery. When I came here, Father told me about prostitutes, etc., but all in all there are still unanswered questions. If mothers don’t tell their children everything, they hear it in bits and pieces, and that can’t be right. Even though it’s Saturday, I’m not bored! That’s because I’ve been up in the attic with Peter. I sat there dreaming with my eyes closed, and it was wonderful. Yours, Anne M. Frank SUNDAY, MARCH 19, 1944 Dearest Kitty, Yesterday was a very important day for me. After lunch everything was as usual. At five I put on the potatoes, and Mother gave me some blood sausage to take to Peter. I didn’t want to at first, but I finally went. He wouldn’t accept the sausage, and I had the dreadful feel- ing it was still because of that argument we’d had about distrust. Suddenly I couldn’t bear it a moment longer and my eyes filled with tears. Without another word, I returned the platter to Mother and went to the bathroom to have a good cry. Afterward I decided to talk things out with Peter. Before dinner the four of us were helping him with a crossword puzzle, so I couldn’t say anything. But as we were sitting down to eat, I whispered to him, “Are you going to practice your shorthand tonight, Peter?” “No,” was his reply. “I’d like to talk to you later on.” He agreed. After the dishes were done, I went to his room and asked if he’d refused the sausage because of our last quarrel. Luckily, that wasn’t the reason; he just thought it was bad manners to seem so eager. It had been very hot downstairs and my face was as red as a lobster. So after taking down some water for Margot, I went back up to get a little fresh air. For the sake of appearances, I first went and stood beside the van Daans’ window before going to Peter’s room. He was standing on the left side of the open window, so I went over to the right side.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  The office staff won’t be able to come upstairs, the potatoes can’t be delivered, Bep won’t get her dinner, we can’t go to the bathroom, we won’t be able to move and all sorts of other inconveniences! We proposed a variety of ways to get rid of her. Mr. van Daan thought a good laxative in her coffee might do the trick. “No,” Mr. Kleiman answered, “please don’t, or we’ll never get her off the can. A roar of laughter. “The can?” Mrs. van D. asked. “What does that mean?” An explanation was given. “Is it all right to use that word?” she asked in perfect innocence. “Just imagine,” Bep giggled, “there you are shopping at The Bijenkorf and you ask the way to the can. They wouldn’t even know what you were talking about!” Dussel now sits on the “can,” to borrow the expression, every day at twelve-thirty on the dot. This afternoon I boldly took a piece of pink paper and wrote: Mr. Dussel’s Toilet Timetable Mornings from 7: 15 to 7:30 A.M. Afternoons after 1 P.M. Otherwise, only as needed! I tacked this to the green bathroom door while he was still inside. I might well have added’ ‘Transgressors will be subject to confinement!” Because our bathroom can be locked from both the inside and the outside. Mr. van Daan’s latest joke: After a Bible lesson about Adam and Eve, a thirteen-year-old boy asked his father, “Tell me, Father, how did I get born?” “Well,” the father replied, “the stork plucked you out of the ocean, set you down in Mother’s bed and bit her in the leg, hard. It bled so much she had to stay in bed for a week.” Not fully satisfied, the boy went to his mother. “Tell me, Mother,” he asked, “how did you get born and how did I get born?” His mother told him the very same story. Finally, hoping to hear the fine points, he went to his grandfather. “Tell me, Grandfather,” he said, “how did you get born and how did your daughter get born?” And for the third time he was told exactly the same story. That night he wrote in his diary: “After careful inquiry, I must conclude that there has been no sexual intercourse in our family for the last three generations!” I still have work to do; it’s already three o’clock. Yours, Anne M. Frank PS. Since I think I’ve mentioned the new cleaning lady, I just want to note that she’s married, sixty years old and hard of hearing! Very convenient, in view of all the noise that eight people in hiding are capable of making. Oh, Kit, it’s such lovely weather. If only I could go outside! WEDNESDAY, MAY 10, 1944 Dearest Kitty, We were sitting in the attic yesterday afternoon working on our French when suddenly I heard the splatter of water behind me. I asked Peter what it might be.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  Then he added the remaining ingredi ents to the ground meat and used a long pipe to force the mixture into the casings. We ate the bratwurst with sauerkraut for lunch, but the sausages, which were going to be canned, had to dry first, so we hung them over a pole suspended from the cethng. Everyone who came into the room burst into laughter when they saw the dangling sausages.It was such a comical sight. The kitchen was a shambles. Mr. van Daan, clad in his wife’s apron and looking fatter than ever, was working away at the meat. What with his bloody hands, red face and spotted apron, he looked like a real butcher. Mrs. D. was trying to do everything at once: learning Dutch out of a book, stirring the soup, watching the meat, sighing and moaning about her broken rib. That’s what happens when old (!) ladies do such stupid exercises to get rid of their fat behinds! Dussel had an eye infection and was sitting next to the stove dabbing his eye with camomile tea. Pim, seated in the one ray of sunshine coming through the window, kept having to move his chair this way and that to stay out of the way. His rheumatism must have been bothering him because he was slightly hunched over and was keeping an eye on Mr. van Daan with an agonized expression on his face. He reminded me of those aged invalids you see in the poor-house. Peter was romping around the room with Mouschi, the cat, while Mother, Margot and I were peeling boiled potatoes. When you get right down to it, none of us were doing our work properly, because we were all so busy watching Mr. van Daan. Dussel has opened his dental practice. Just for fun, I’ll describe the session with his very first patient. Mother was ironing, and Mrs. van D., the first victim, sat down on a chair in the middle of the room. Dussel, unpacking his case with an air of importance, asked for some eau de cologne, which could be used as a disinfectant, and vaseline, which would have to do for wax. He looked in Mrs. Van D.’s mouth and found two teeth that made her wince with pain and utter incoherent cries every time he touched them. After a lengthy examination (lengthy as far as Mrs. van D. was concerned, since it actually took no longer than two minutes), Dussel began to scrape out a cavity. But Mrs. van D. had no intention of letting him. She flailed her arms and legs until Dussel finally let go of his probe and it . . . remained stuck in Mrs. van D.’s tooth. That really did it! Mrs. van D. lashed out wildly in all directions, cried (as much as you can with an instrument like that in your mouth), tried to remove it, but only managed to push it in even farther. Mr.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  Without pausing to reply, he dashed up to the loft-the scene of the disaster -- and shoved Mouschi, who was squatting beside her soggy litter box, back to the right place. This was followed by shouts and squeals, and then Mouschi, who by that time had finished peeing, took off downstairs. In search of something similar to her box, Mouschi had found herself a pile of wood shavings, right over a crack in the floor. The puddle immediately trickled down to the attic and, as luck would have it, landed in and next to the potato barrel. The cethng was dripping, and since the attic floor has also got its share of cracks, little yellow drops were leaking through the ceiling and onto the dining table, between a pile of stockings and books. I was doubled up with laughter, it was such a funny sight. There was Mouschi crouched under a chair, Peter armed with water, powdered bleach and a cloth, and Mr. van Daan trying to calm everyone down. The room was soon set to rights, but it’s a well-known fact that cat puddles stink to high heaven. The potatoes proved that all too well, as did the wood shavings, which Father collected in a bucket and brought downstairs to burn. Poor Mouschi! How were you to know it’s impossible to get peat for your box? Anne THURSDAY, MAY 11, 1944 Dearest Kitty, A new sketch to make you laugh: Peter’s hair had to be cut, and as usual his mother was to be the hairdresser. At seven twenty-five Peter vanished into his room, and reappeared at the stroke of seven-thirty, stripped down to his blue swimming trunks and a pair of tennis shoes. “Are you coming?” he asked his mother. “Yes, I’ll be up in a minute, but I can’t find the scissors!” Peter helped her look, rummaging around in her cosmetics drawer. “Don’t make such a mess, Peter,” she grumbled. I didn’t catch Peter’s reply, but it must have been insolent, because she cuffed him on the arm. He cuffed her back, she punched him with all her might, and Peter pulled his arm away with a look of mock horror on his face. “Come on, old girl!” Mrs. van D. stayed put. Peter grabbed her by the wrists and pulled her all around the room. She laughed, cried, scolded and kicked, but nothing helped. Peter led his prisoner as far as the attic stairs, where he was obliged to let go of her. Mrs. van D. came back to the room and collapsed into a chair with a loud sigh. “Die Enifu”hruna der Mutter,”. I joked. [* The Abduction of Mother, a possible reference to Mozart’s opera The Abduction from the Seraglio.] “Yes, but he hurt me.” I went to have a look and cooled her hot, red wrists with water. Peter, still by the stairs and growing impa- tient again, strode into the room with his belt in his hand, like a lion tamer. Mrs.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  out, and in these times of scarcity, tossing away a piece of paper is clearly taboo. So I can only advise you not to reread the above passage and to make no attempt to get to the bottom of it, because you’ll never find your way out again! Yours, Anne MONDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1942 Dearest Kitty, Hanukkah and St. Nicholas Day nearly coincided this year; they were only one day apart. We didn’t make much of a fuss with Hanukkah, merely exchanging a few small gifts and lighting the candles. Since candles are in short supply, we lit them for only ten minutes, but as long as we sing the song, that doesn’t matter. Mr. van Daan made a menorah out of wood, so that was taken care of too. St. Nicholas Day on Saturday was much more fun. During dinner Bep and Miep were so busy whispering to Father that our curiosity was aroused and we suspected they were up to something. Sure enough, at eight o’clock we all trooped downstairs through the hall in pitch darkness (it gave me the shivers, and I wished I was safely back upstairs!) to the alcove. We could switch on the light, since this room doesn’t have any windows. When that was done, Father opened the big cabinet. “Oh, how wonderful!” we all cried. In the corner was a large basket decorated with colorful paper and a mask of Black Peter. We quickly took the basket upstairs with us. Inside was a little gift for everyone, including an appropriate verse. Since you’re famthar with the kinds of poems peo ple write each other on St. Nicholas Day, I won’t copy them down for you. I received a Kewpie doll, Father got bookends, and so on. Well anyway, it was a nice idea, and since the eight of us had never celebrated St. Nicholas Day before, this was a good time to begin. Yours, Anne PS. We also had presents for everyone downstairs, a few things .left over from

• From Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (1989)

  37 The middle phrase in this involved formula reminds us that a central feature of any valid calling was that it be of benefit to humans. Perk in s's definition of the calling was "a c erta ine kind of life, ordained and i m posed on man by God, for the common good". 38 The theol o gical background to this do ctrine, as we saw, was that t he creato r intends the preservation of the creatu r e. Humans serve God's pur poses in taking the appointed means to p reserve themselves in being. This d o es n ' t m ean that we are called u pon t o p reserv e others at our own expense; t h ere i s no question of renunciation. Rather we are c alled upon to serve both o u r selve s an d others as being equally humans and God's creatures. An d bey ond this, our work must be the occasion of our dedicating o u rs el ves mor e fully to God. Perkins insists t hat both the general and the p a rticula r callin gs "must be joyned, as body and soul are joy n ed in a living rna n", 39 F or Robert B olton, the Christian sh ould "ever go about the a ffaires o f h is C alli ng with a heavenly mind, se asoned , and sanctified with habitu al p r ay e r ... pregnant with heavenly matter and medita t ion " . 4 0 W e see here the basis for one stran d of Weber's thesis about Protestantism a s t h e nu rt uring ground of capitalism. Weber thought that the Puritan notion o f th e call ing helped to fo ster a wa y o f life focussed on disciplined and 2.2.6 • THE AFFIRMATION OF ORDINARY LIFE ra t ionalized and regular work, coup led with frugal habits of consumption, and that this f o rm of life greatly facili t ated the implantation of industrial capitalism. There may be some quarrel on the latter half of this thesis, that is, c oncerning t he degree to which t his new work culture wa s wi despread among capitalists and their workers, or whether i t w as or was not essent ial to capitalism's development. But the fir st half of the claim seems well founded .

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  Those who enjoy the naughtiness factor want and need the very rules and limits they get such a kick out of challenging—one more erotic paradox. Without boundaries to push against, there is no joy in naughtiness. If hookers roaming the streets were as meaningless to Judy as newspaper boys, they could no longer serve her as symbols of wanton lust. During the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, when many restrictions from the past were cast aside, it became increasingly difficult to feel naughty. Some of my clients during that period complained about having too much freedom. I’m convinced that the attempts of many individuals and groups to shore up traditional values during the 1980s and 1990s haven’t come simply from antisexual, moral, or political motivations. How many, do you suppose, want tighter restrictions on sex because they miss having strong prohibitions to push against? Could a desire for forbidden pleasure be an unconscious source for “antisexual” attitudes? Consider the following evidence. CATHOLICISM, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, AND THE NAUGHTINESS FACTORThe thrill of violating prohibitions is clearly evident in all segments of The Group, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, or religious affiliations. But whereas The Group as a whole mentions the naughtiness factor in 37 percent of their peak encounters, three subgroups are especially likely to do so: (1) 69 percent of those raised as Catholics, (2) 64 percent of lesbians, and (3) 41 percent of gay men. I believe the primary reason is their shared experience of growing up in sexually repressive environments. Those raised Catholic, even those who no longer think of themselves as members of the church, still exhibit a passionate involvement with the naughtiness factor—evidence that adult erotic patterns are launched early in our lives. It’s just as the erotic equation predicts: the more consistently disapproving messages surround us when we’re growing up, the greater our affinity for the forbidden will be when we’re adults. Most Catholic children are strongly discouraged from pursuing their natural sexual curiosity as kids. Nevertheless, most get the message that sexual expression will become at least acceptable in the eyes of God once they grow up and marry. In contrast, children who will become gay learn that the most fundamental feature of their eroticism—whom they’re attracted to—is and always will be totally unacceptable. To make matters worse, homophobic attitudes take root long before people know anything about their own sexual orientation. Once attitudes are internalized in this way, a conscious effort is required to change them. Coming out is so important to gays and lesbians because it begins the necessary shift in self-perception.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  As soon as a boy asks if he can bicycle home with me and we get to talking, nine times out of ten I can be sure he’ll become enamored on the spot and won’t let me out of his sight for a second. His ardor eventually cools, especially since I ignore his passionate glances and pedal blithely on my way. If it gets so bad that they start rambling on about “asking Father’s permission,” I swerve slightly on my bike, my schoolbag falls, and the young man feels obliged to get off his bike and hand me the bag, by which time I’ve switched the conversation to another topic. These are the most innocent types. Of course, there are those who blow you kisses or try to take hold of your arm, but they’re definitely knocking on the wrong door. I get off my bike and either refuse to make further use of their company or act as if I’m insulted and tell them in no uncertain terms to go on home without me. There you are. We’ve now laid the basis for our friendship. Until tomorrow. SUNDAY, JUNE 21, 1942 Dearest Kitty, Our entire class is quaking in its boots. The reason, of course, is the upcoming meeting in which the teachers decide who’ll be promoted to the next grade and who’ll be kept back. Half the class is making bets. G.Z. and I laugh ourselves sick at the two boys behind us, C.N. and Jacques Kocernoot, who have staked their entire vacation savings on their bet. From morning to night, it’s “You’re going to pass, No, I’m not,” “Yes, you are,” “No, I’m not.” Even G.’s pleading glances and my angry outbursts can’t calm them down. If you ask me, there are so many dummies that about a quarter of the class should be kept back, but teachers are the most unpredictable creatures on earth. Maybe this time they’ll be unpredictable in the right direction for a change. I’m not so worried about my girlfriends and myself. We’ll make it. The only subject I’m not sure about is math. Anyway, all we can do is wait. Until then, we keep telling each other not to lose heart. I get along pretty well with all my teachers. There are nine of them, seven men and two women. Mr. Keesing, the old fogey who teaches math, was mad at me for the longest time because I talked so much. After several warnings, he assigned me extra homework. An essay on the subject “A Chatterbox.” A chatterbox, what can you write about that? I’d wbrry about that later, I decided. I jotted down the assignment in my notebook, tucked it in my bag and tried to keep quiet. That evening, after I’d finished the rest of my homework, the note about the essay caught my eye. I began thinking about the subject while chewing the tip of my fountain pen.

• From Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity (1989)

  The picture of man as strivi n g by necessity t o preserve and expand his happiness is not just the correct result of deta ch e d refle ction ; it is also the true basis of the moral life. It needs to be rescued n o t only from false spiritualist explanato ry theories but also fr om the f a l se depreciation that it has suffered at the hands of religion and metaph ys ic s , which have called o n me n to deny these impulses i n the name of p ur e l y imagina ry goods and satisfactions. Que l'homme cesse de chercher h ors du monde qu'il habite, des etres qui lui procurent un bonheur q u e la nature lui refuse: qu'il etudie cette nature, qu'il apprenne ses lois, qu'il contemple son ene rgie et la fa�on immu a ble dont elle agit; qu'il applique ses decouvertes a sa propre felicite, et qu'il s e soumette en silence a des lois auxquelle s rien n e peut le soustraire. Let man cease to search outside of the world he lives in, for beings that pro vide him with a happin ess which nature refuses him: let him stu dy nature, that he learn its l� ws, that h e contemplate its energy and the immutable way it acts; let him apply his discoveries to his own felicity, a nd submit in silence to laws from whose binding force nothing can remove him.12 The materialist picture of human beings as driven by necessity to self preservation and satisfaction is sternly defended by Holbach not j ust as the correct conclusion of observing reason but also as the deliverance of ultimately undistorted moral insight. This latter comes to climactic expression i n the last chapter of the work in the voice of Nature herself , call i ng to us humans: 0 vous, dit-elle, q u i, d'apres l'impulsion que je vous donne, tendez vers le b onheur dans chaque instant de votre duree , ne resistez pas a m a loi souveraine. Travaillez a votre felicite; jouissez s ans crainte, soyez heureux Vainement, o superstitieux! cherches-tu ton bien-etre au dela des bornes de l'univers ou ma m a in t'a place. Vainement le demandes-tu a ces fantomes inexorables que ton im a gination veu t etablir sur mon t ron e eternel . . . vainement comptes-tu sur ces deites capricieuses d ont l a bien f a is an ce t'extasie, t andis qu'elles ne remplissent ton sejo ur que d e calamites, de fra yeurs, de gemissemens, c!'illusions. Ose done t'affr an ch i r du jou g de cette rel ig ion, m a supe r be riv a le, qui me c onna it mes lois .

• From The Erotic Mind (1995)

  “The sight of his naked body was too exciting to describe.” “I didn’t think I was capable of feeling so much.” Women are more likely than men to make such comments (half of the women compared to 40 percent of the men). The three subgroups most likely to mention the intensity of their sensations and orgasms are lesbians (64 percent), bisexual women (63 percent), and bisexual men (60 percent). People often mention being in tune with their “animal nature” during peak turn-ons. This connection with the instinctual, noncerebral world of the body not only brings with it a sense of strength and power, but also unrestrained feelings of joy. It’s not unusual for men and women to be surprised by their own sexual capabilities and stamina. The liberal use of superlatives frequently makes storytellers sound like athletes describing those ineffable moments when they are so in touch with their bodies that extraordinary feats become effortless. But what stands out most is the total lack of struggle and the ease of it all. For some, especially women, the ability to experience several orgasms within a brief period of time, or throughout an extended lovemaking session, becomes a symbol of their extraordinary responsiveness. Alexandra’s encounter features multiple orgasms and an attentive, encouraging partner: I was having a relationship with an older man. One time we were making love and he was totally focused on me. As he stroked and manipulated my clit, he also kissed my breasts and sucked my nipples. He held me tight when I came which immediately made me come again. Then he finger-fucked me with such intensity that I came again. He said, “Come on darling,” knowing full well that I had another orgasm stored in me. After I went down on him and he came in my mouth, he concentrated on my “encore” and I climaxed one last time. Whew! Although multiple orgasms are fairly common during peak sex, they’re by no means required. Nonetheless, when it comes to sensual and orgasmic intensity, if a little is good, more is usually better. Sometimes, though, an encounter stands out not because of its intensity, but rather because it contains a gradual discovery of simple pleasures previously hidden or actively avoided. Harold, age fifty-seven, describes the quiet drama of such a moment: I don’t like to admit it, but I’ve never liked being touched. Partly it’s because I’m ticklish. I know this sounds strange, but sometimes my wife’s touch reminds me of when my mom would try to hug me when I was a teenager and it felt awkward and I wanted to escape. As a man I prefer to have sex mostly with my genitals. Leave the rest of me alone. I’m just not the touchy-feely type.