“The natural role of twentieth-century man is anxiety.”
Gen. Edward Cummings, in Pt. 1, Ch. 6
Source: The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Quotes from book
The Naked and the Dead
The Naked and the Dead is a 1948 novel by Norman Mailer. It was partly based on his experiences with the 112th Cavalry Regiment during the Philippines Campaign in World War II. It was adapted into a film of the same name in 1958. This novel was Mailer's first best seller, published when he was 25 years old; it was the first popular novel about World War II.In 1998 the Modern Library ranked The Naked and the Dead 51st on its list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century.
Source: The Naked and the Dead
On Sgt. Sam Croft and Mt. Anaka, in Pt. 3, Ch. 3
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Gen. Edward Cummings, in Pt. 1, Ch. 11
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Pt. 3, Ch. 10
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
On Maj. Dalleson, in Pt. 4, Ch. 1
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Lieutenant Robert Hearn, Pt. 2, Ch. 12
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Pt. 3, Ch. 14
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
“I hate everything which is not in myself.”
Sgt. Sam Croft, in Pt. 1, Ch. 5
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Gen. Edward Cummings, in Pt. 1, Ch. 6
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Gen. Edward Cummings, in Pt. 1, Ch. 3
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Context: You're a fool if you don't realize this is going to be the reactionary's century, perhaps their thousand-year reign. It's the one thing Hitler said which wasn't completely hysterical.
Mailer's Introduction to the 50th Anniversary Edition (1998)
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Context: For that is the genius of the old man — Tolstoy teaches us that compassion is of value and enriches our life only when compassion is severe, which is to say when we can perceive everything that is good and bad about a character but are still able to feel that the sum of us as human beings is probably a little more good than awful … That fine edge in Tolstoy, the knowledge that compassion is valueless without severity (for otherwise it cannot defend itself against sentimentality), gave The Naked and the Dead whatever enduring virtue it may possess and catapulted the amateur who wrote it into the grim ranks of those successful literary men and women who are obliged to become professional in order to survive …
“To make an Army work you have to have every man in it fitted into a fear ladder…”
Gen. Edward Cummings, in Pt. 1, Ch. 6
The Naked and the Dead (1948)
Context: To make an Army work you have to have every man in it fitted into a fear ladder… The Army functions best when you're frightened of the man above you, and contemptuous of your subordinates.
