John Topics

I know of only one mystical poem that is satisfactorily successful, The Obscure Night of the Soul, by St. john of the Cross. In that amazing poem, what is said counts for almost nothing, but is sublimated into the purposed significance. The artist does not intend to go so far as that, but in seeking an incorruptible unity, he is always something of a mystic. Unlike the mystic, he clings to the world of things, though he transmutes it. He can never say the whole of what he means, but the mystic cannot say at all what he means; for his meaning is something singular and indivisible, something absolute in its inexpressibility. The simple lover in Cyrano can only say “I love you,” but the poet Cyrano can say the same thing in a hundred elaborate ways.
—Leo Stein (1872–1947)

Hannah Hunter: Medicine is the most noble and unselfish—
Col. john Marlowe: Sure, noble profession, noble oath, lanterns held on high—so high they won’t admit they’re gropin’ for.... There was a girl, not much older than that boy in there. I wasn’t unfair then, understand. Because they used a lot of fancy words that an ordinary section hand wouldn’t understand. So I held her down, while two of them worked on her. I trusted doctors then, believed in ‘em, because I was in love, and I didn’t want to see her die. A tumor they said it was, and it had to come out right away. So they stuck a leather strap in her mouth so she could bite off her screams, while they cut a way to get in there. And what did they find—nothing! Oh, they were sorry. Sure. They made a mistake. They had something they could talk about before their next little experiment. But what about me. They left me beggin’ her not to die. And I lost my wife.
—John Lee Mahin (1902–1984)

Children became an obsessive theme in Victorian culture at the same time that they were being exploited as never before. As the horrors of life multiplied for some children, the image of childhood was increasingly exalted. Children became the last symbols of purity in a world which was seen as increasingly ugly.
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)