Word: spartanism
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Such a view contrasts sharply with that of the militant Gaddafi, whose tastes are spartan and anti-imperialist. The son of a nomadic horse and camel trader, he lived in a tent throughout his childhood. With the help of a tutor, he studied at night by the light of an oil lamp, and he remains fiercely proud that he skipped several grades after entering school. He traces his political consciousness to the late 1950s. "Everything was happening," he says. "Arab nationalism was exploding. The Suez Canal had been nationalized by the Egyptians in 1956; Algeria was fighting for its independence...
Henry David Thoreau went into the woods to confront what he grandly called "the essential facts of life." Spartan-like, he observed flowers blooming, raindrops falling, seasons changing. Of course, the essential facts of Thoreau's life included Emerson's loan of the cabin site at Walden Pond and such genteel activities as frequent walks into Concord for civilized conversation and home cooking. H.D.T. had it both ways, which is more than can be said for the nature he wrote about. The shadow of the surveyor and his Damoclean plumb bob had already fallen across the land...
...Spartan nude beneath the shimmer of a robe; her hair on end and her eyes bright in some dubious ecstasy. This is not she. The woman whirls, the short and tight black body glowing in red lights, and his eyes see the flame-dripping dagger. This is not she. He scratches in his sleep. Snorts, and is angry. Turns and is at rest...
...learned from George Abbott, "so that no matter what happens, you feel you are still working." His habit is to get one night's sleep and plunge back to work, either as a producer in his bright, psychedelic office in Rockefeller Center or as a director in a spartan white study at the top of his Manhattan town house. After the draining experience of Night Music, however, he plans to sit and read for a while, and will eventually wind up, no doubt, at the remote mountaintop house he and his wife Judy have in Majorca. "I am going...
...Alsop's December and January columns were discussing the virtues of militarism, President Nixon with the blessing of the Chinese, was engaging in a stratospheric martial exercise over Hanoi. In an AP interview--conducted during the bombing but released later--Nixon commented, "It's important to live like a Spartan." He went on: "I believe in the battle, whether it's the battle of a campaign, or the battle of this office, which is a continuing battle...