Word: proteans
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LIFTON has hit on a very important concept here, yet he insists on finding the reason for the phenomenon of Protean man in the malaise caused by the atomic bomb. In fact, while the bomb may have disoriented members of Lifton's generation, it is implausible to suggest that it accounts for the Protean man. The contemporary adult or young adult does not have as vivid a memory or understanding of the bombing as did Lifton, or John Hersey, and can not relate to it in the terms Lifton suggests. While psychological disorientation and the Protean state are observable...
Although he fails to provide a convincing link between Hiroshima and the revolutionary movement, Lifton does formulate one very intriguing thesis from his analysis of the aftermath of the nuclear era. He postulates the existence of what he calls Protean man, a man who has lost the boundaries of his own self. Protean man is in a state of total confusion, and finds himself embracing a series of conflicting ideologies for no apparent reason. "Until relatively recently, no more than one major ideological shift was likely to occur in a lifetime, and that one would be long remembered...
...songwriter should be able to maintain a consistency of style and feeling is not unusual, but in a solo album the establishment of such an identity too often comes at the expense of variety. Fortunately Cale is a complex man, and he has plotted Violence with a subtlety and protean vigor that overwhelms the threat of monotony. If Cale can be called a genius, it is because he achieves in a solo album the multiple development and reinforcement of feeling usually attributed to the best albums by groups...
Quackser is an urban savage who prefers shoveling horse manure from the streets of Dublin and spreading it on ladies' flowers to working in the foundry with his father. Without Wilder's protean talents, the film could have been absurd: an upper-middle-class American girl studying at Trinity College (Margot Kidder) nearly runs Quackser over in an MG but winds up taking him to her farewell dance and ultimately to bed. Wilder makes the affair believable by investing his role with an appealing integrity as well as sexual overtones; he himself added two scenes early...
...Protean as the President's efforts have been, they have not been altogether convincing. Nixon called the state and territorial Governors to the White House to talk about "current matters before us regarding both foreign and domestic matters." There was no discussion about controlling National Guard trigger fingers; Nixon defended his Cambodian strategy at length. He and Henry Kissinger also chatted informally with Governors Robert McNair of South Carolina, John Love of Colorado, and John Dempsey of Connecticut. On short notice, Nixon dropped in on a meeting of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. executive council, a body that has always been...