Source: Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World
"For the Baptist" Flowers of Sion (1623).
“Life Among the Savages is a disrespectful memoir of my children.”
Stanley J. Kunitz and Howard Harcraft's Twentieth Century Authors (1954)
Quotes in his letter to Jaque Berne, 29 April, 1949 (the day after his return to Paris); as cited in ; as cited in 'Dubuffet, Lévi-Strauss, and the Idea of Art Brut', Kent Minturn http://www.columbia.edu/cu/arthistory/faculty/Minturn/Dubuffet-Levi-Strauss.pdf, p. 250
1940's
Lecture at Westminster Abbey (1873); as quoted in Hinduism : A Religion to Live By (1997) by Nirad C. Chaudhari <!-- Oxford University Press February pp. 116 -117 -->
Context: The worship of Shiva, Vishnu, and other popular deities was of the same and in many cases of a more degraded and savage character than the worship of Jupiter, Apollo or Minerva.... A religion may linger on for a long time, it may be accepted by large masses of the people, because it is there, and there is nothing better. But when a religion has ceased to produce defenders of the faith, prophets, champions, martyrs, it has ceased to live, in the true sense of the word; and in that sense the old orthodox Brahmanism has ceased to live for more than a thousand years.
Source: 1930s, Power: A New Social Analysis (1938), Ch. 15: Power and moral codes
“Modern man has much to learn from the people he calls 'savages.'”
Reflections (1981)
Context: The pygmies are one of the most cultured peoples on the face of the earth. They live a wonderful life, a life of purity. Not only are they busy and productive, they're happy and healthy as well. If we puny Americans had to live under their conditions, we'd perish in a day. Modern man has much to learn from the people he calls 'savages.' Before we are down to the last blade of grass it would be wise to study the life of the Pygmies. The secret of our own survival rests with them, the people who know how to make the most out of very little and find complete happiness with the bare essentials.
“The savage in man is never quite eradicated.”
September 26, 1859
Journals (1838-1859)
The idea that Western thought might be exotic if viewed from another landscape never presents itself to most Westerners.
Blues People: Negro Music in White America (1963), p. 8
Novalis (1829)
Context: The ideal of Morality has no more dangerous rival than the ideal of highest Strength, of most powerful life; which also has been named (very falsely as it was there meant) the ideal of poetic greatness. It is the maximum of the savage; and has, in these times, gained, precisely among the greatest weaklings, very many proselytes. By this ideal, man becomes a Beast-Spirit, a Mixture; whose brutal wit has, for weaklings, a brutal power of attraction.
