yeah, but this is the city that has, since 1991 (wiki), featured the following text in one of their most-used subway station walkways:fek:
Um. In their TRAIN OF THOUGHT subway series, the MTA has quoted Arthur Schopenhauer’s essays Studies in Pessimism. I repeat, the MTA has quoted Arthur Schopenhauer’s Studies in Pessimism. Luckily this wasn’t pulled from the essay “On Suicide.”
I generally applaud these “public arts” initiatives, like the Poetry in Motion series (which I’ve also seen in LA), but the selections for Train of Thought always seem misguided and, as fek points out, pessimistic. I’m not saying I disagree, but out of any context, this is so not the way you want to start your daily commute. One of the other Train of Thought quotes is the first sentence of Kafka’s Metamorphosis. Just the first sentence. Kafka’s totally on the classics list, but the first sentence kind of doesn’t mean much or evoke anything without all the other sentences. I guess the point is to get people to want to read more, which is commendable, but I’m not sure if that’s what the average straphanger is pulling from that. Nice try, MTA.
Overslept,
So tired.
If late,
Get fired.
Why bother?
Why the pain?
Just go home
Do it again.
for better or worse (or both depending on how i feel that day) cheerfulness and inspirational…ness aren’t exactly things NYC is known for priding itself for. plus, while the source material may be pessimistic, out of context i like this quote - it provides some food for thought, which i always took as the point of these things more than getting people reading (i feel like the fact that there is, in fact, a world outside your limits of vision is the kind of thing you can easily contemplate all the way from 238th to south ferry… though granted it’s the kind of thing i actively try to contemplate for prolonged periods of time on a regular basis so maybe i’m just weird).
