Thursday, July 16, 2009

Thought for the Day: Andrei Codrescu on Culture as Creation of Peripheral Souls

It can be argued that all the imaginary countries of literature have been authored by literal or metaphorical exiles. Western consciousness is the creation of peripheral souls. Under pressure from them, the center moves to redefine itself.

Andrei Codrescu, The Disappearance of the Outside: A Manifesto for Escape (Reading, PA: Addison-Wesley, 1990) (p. 92).