Rushdie, Salman -- Speech (2012-05-06), Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture, PEN World Voices Festival, New York City

Dave — Wed, 29 Jul 2026 18:06:40 +0000

Great art, or, let’s just say, more modestly, original art is never created in the safe middle ground, but always at the edge. Originality is dangerous. It challenges, questions, overturns assumptions, unsettles moral codes, disrespects sacred cows or other such entities. It can be shocking, or ugly, or, to use the catch-all term so beloved of the tabloid press, controversial. And if we believe in liberty, if we want the air we breathe to remain plentiful and breathable, this is the art whose right to exist we must not only defend, but celebrate. Art is not entertainment. At its very best, it’s a revolution.

Salman Rushdie (b. 1947) Indian novelist
Speech (2012-05-06), Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture, PEN World Voices Festival, New York City

Printed as an essay (2012-05-11), "On Censorship," The New Yorker magazine.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- Essay (1841), “Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series, No. 2

Dave — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 16:02:52 +0000

Your goodness must have some edge to it, — else it is none.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Essay (1841), “Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series, No. 2

This essay was inspired by his reading of Walter Savage Landor in 1833, with passages pulled from his lecture "Individualism," last in his course on "The Philosophy of History" (1836–1837), with other passages from the lectures "School," "Genius," and "Duty" in his course on "Human Life" (1838–1839).

WIST Quotations

Rushdie, Salman -- Speech (2012-05-06), Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture, PEN World Voices Festival, New York City

Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- Essay (1841), “Self-Reliance,” Essays: First Series, No. 2