Wendell Berry (1934) author
Interview in New Perspectives Quarterly (1992), quoted in his Profile at The Poetry Foundation http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=540
https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/ksummit-discuss/2016-August/003580.html
2010s, 2017
Wendell Berry (1934) author
Interview in New Perspectives Quarterly (1992), quoted in his Profile at The Poetry Foundation http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poet.html?id=540
Bharistan-i-Shahi
“We are created by being destroyed.”
Franz Wright (1953–2015) American poet
“You are in constant danger of being destroyed.”
Bram van Velde (1895–1981) Dutch painter
1960's, Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde' (1965 - 1969)
Muhammad of Ghor (1160–1206) Ghurid Sultan
Louis Frédéric, L'Inde de l'Islam, quoted in Koenraad Elst, Decolonizing the Hindu Mind, Rupa (2001)
“Power is being told you're not loved and not being destroyed by it.”
Madonna (1958) American singer, songwriter, and actress
Philip Pullman book Northern Lights
Variant: Human beings can’t see anything without wanting to destroy it, Lyra. That’s original sin.
Source: His Dark Materials, The Golden Compass (1995), Ch. 21 : Lord Asriel's Welcome
Haruki Murakami book Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
Variant: It takes years to build up, it takes moments to destroy.
Source: Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World (1985), Chapter 19: Hamburgers,Skyline and Deadline
Source: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
Context: Once again, life had a lesson to teach me: It takes years to build up, it takes moments to destroy. Sure, I'd gotten tired of this tiny space, but I'd had a good home here. In the time it takes to swill two cans of beer, all had had sublimed like morning mist. My job, my whiskey, my peace and quiet, my solitude, my Sormerset Maugham, and John Ford collections-all of it trashed and worthless.
J. Posadas (1912–1981) Argentine Trotskyist (1912-1981)
Attributed
War is Not the End of the World, 1972