Word: vaguest
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...mean it. For him it is "that wall to lean my back on," the Berlin Philharmonic. Such is the trust between Karajan and his musicians that he often conducts with his eyes closed. "I can feel the players better," he says. He gives few entry cues and the vaguest of cutoff gestures. Explains Karajan: "Baton technique is what the people see, but it is all nonsense. The hands do their job because they have learned what to do. In the performance I forget about them. The molding comes when the orchestra and conductor come together in a sort of union...
Dianetics, retooled as the religion of Scientology, has since developed most of the accouterments of other faiths-liturgies, clerical collars, but only the vaguest sort of theology. Unconvinced that it was indeed a religion and noting that Hubbard received 10% of all revenues, the Internal Revenue Service in 1959 got the courts to deny Scientology a tax exemption. Later, however, Scientology beat an ill-conceived medical fraud case against E-meters by the Food and Drug Administration, and has won limited recognition as a religion...
Simenon's failure here is due to the lack of any coherent understanding of the craft of writing--or in this case, dictating, which only resembles real writing insofar as it is printed. Simenon starts with only the vaguest notions of what he will do and after a certain prescribed period of time (in the case of Letters to My Mother, one day), finishes. In that time a simple story-line emerges, sustained by the most elementary event-to-event, casual thinking. Ironically this dearth of complexity is the peculiar strength of his roman policier: the name Maigret itself connotes...
...were caught unprepared, and have fallen behind in the processing. "Organization!" scoffed Stuart Callison, an Agency for International Development official assigned to Pendleton. "We beat the first load of refugees here by an hour and a half. That's how organized we are. I haven't the vaguest idea what's going on. I get all my news out of the Los Angeles Times." William Wild, another AID official who is in charge of the Pendleton operation, considered himself in business once he was able to lease a small data-processing machine for 90 days...
...students' career aspirations show only the vaguest commitment to social welfare and reveal a desire to play safe. The shift away from graduate study in academic disciplines and toward the professions, particularly law and medicine, shows the primacy of role and allows them to retain an ambiguity in their attitude toward class. While some students seek to escape organizational constraint by pursuing careers as writers or artists, few search for a life of creative activity. When pressed, many of these free souls will reveal the ambition of celebrity. A commitment to significant work does not distinguish them from the aspirants...