“[Henrik Ibsen] worried about storms, both on sea and land, about bathing (‘can easily bring on a fatal attack of cramp’), about horses (‘well known for their habit of kicking’) and anyone with a sporting gun (‘keep well away from people carrying such weapons’). He was particularly scared of carriage accidents. He was so obsessed by the danger of hailstones that he took to measuring their circumference. To the annoyance of children, he insisted on blowing out the candles on Christmas trees because of the fire risk.”
—Paul Johnson, Intellectuals
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“Lucy Van Pelt: Are you afraid of responsibility? If you are, then you have hypengyophobia.
“Charlie Brown: I don't think that's quite it.
“Lucy Van Pelt: How about cats? If you're afraid of cats, you have ailurophasia.
“Charlie Brown: Well, sort of, but I'm not sure.
“Lucy Van Pelt: Are you afraid of staircases? If you are, then you have climacaphobia. Maybe you have thalassophobia. This is fear of the ocean, or gephyrobia, which is the fear of crossing bridges. Or maybe you have pantophobia. Do you think you have pantophobia?
“Charlie Brown: What's pantophobia?
“Lucy Van Pelt: The fear of everything.
“Charlie Brown (shouting): That’s it.”
—Charles M. Schulz, A Charlie Brown Christmas
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“Was this the case with everyone – everyone, that is, who wasn’t already a thalidomide baked-bean, or a gangrenous imbecile, or degradingly poor, or irretrievably ugly, and would therefore have pretty obvious targets for their worries? If so, the notion of ‘having problems’ – or ‘having a harder life than most people’, or ‘having a harder life than you usually had’ – was spurious. You don’t have problems, only a capacity for feeling anxious about them, which shifts and jostles but doesn’t change.”
—Martin Amis, The Rachel Papers
Posted by mesh at August 2, 2006 03:52 PM | TrackBack