Word: greatness
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...TIME OF YOUR LIFE. William Saroyan's play is revived with great care and affection by the Lincoln Center Repertory Company. In the context of 1969, this 30-year-old work is revealed as a kind of prophecy prefiguring changing dramatic trends and the skeptical questioning of American values...
...immediately reflects the sepia-tinted, ignorance-is-bliss tenor of that carefree era. There are the flappers doing their frenetic Charleston, the dastardly villains and wistful heroines of the silent screen. Soon a couple of European political upstarts make their appearance: A. Hitler and B. Mussolini. Moving through the Great Depression and World War II, the film traces the ever more sophisticated use of all communications forms-radio, candid camera, wireless photos, TV -to capture the substance and essence of the times...
...particular heresy of Americans that they see themselves as potential saints more than as real-life sinners. Seen in the transfiguring mirror of patriotism, the history of America is a record of triumph over adversity, moral earnestness and accomplishment. America's libertarian achievements and idealism certainly justify great pride; and the nation's technological record in taming nature is one of the world's wonders. But Americans have insufficiently considered the possibility that this record is also tarred with betrayals of the nation's democratic ideals, and that no nation has a solitary, superior claim...
...world wars changed all that. The Nurnberg Trial of 22 Nazi leaders after World War II revived one of the great tenets of Western thought: that a higher law sometimes requires men to give their primary allegiance to humanity rather than the State. Although the Nazi defendants pleaded "state orders," 19 were convicted and ten were hanged. To skeptics, Nurnberg proved mainly that losing a war had become a crime under international law. Nevertheless, the supremacy of civilized rules of behavior was enunciated in a U.N. report: "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his government...
...instance, we can volunteer to help the Cambridge Welfare Services, which badly needs assistance. Even a talk or a visit with the old and sick people in the area would cheer them tremendously. Some need help buying groceries and getting coal or firewood. And it would take no great effort to help them...