“It would be a bitter cosmic joke if we destroy ourselves due to atrophy of the imagination.”

— Martha Gellhorn

Letter as quoted in "Gellhorn: A Twentieth Century Life" (2003) written by Caroline Moorehead.
Context: War happens to people, one by one. That is really all I have to say and it seems to me I have been saying it forever. Unless they are immediate victims, the majority of mankind behaves as if war was an act of God which could not be prevented; or they behave as if war elsewhere was none of their business. It would be a bitter cosmic joke if we destroy ourselves due to atrophy of the imagination.

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Martha Gellhorn 8

journalist from the United States 1908–1998

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