From the book description: the need for some to seek adventure as a means of escape from our relatively safe modern world: "Life in modern society is designed to eliminate as many unforeseen events as possible, and as inviting as that seems, it leaves us hopelessly underutilized.... Threats to our safety and comfort have been so completely wiped out that we have to go out of our way to create them."
Interesting way of putting it and if anyone ever reads this post I'd be interested in hearing opinions on it. Junger's writing tends to cut right to the core and I like the way he seeks out the people most effected by whatever it is he's writing about. I find this far more interesting than the wider social or political ramifications. I read Fire a few years ago but the two things that stuck with me the most were the profiles on the Northern Alliance (Afghanistan) leader Massoud and the story about Cypress. Massoud was the one guy on the planet who seemed to get what the Taliban was up to and if people had listened to him 9/11 might not have happened. The story on Cypress led me to the conclusion that the solution to preventing neighbors from killing each may be to put up a fence and wait a few generations before letting those people interact again.
the need for some to seek adventure as a means of escape from our relatively safe modern world: "Life in modern society is designed to eliminate as many unforeseen events as possible, and as inviting as that seems, it leaves us hopelessly underutilized.... Threats to our safety and comfort have been so completely wiped out that we have to go out of our way to create them."
Interesting way of putting it and if anyone ever reads this post I'd be interested in hearing opinions on it.
Junger's writing tends to cut right to the core and I like the way he seeks out the people most effected by whatever it is he's writing about. I find this far more interesting than the wider social or political ramifications.
I read Fire a few years ago but the two things that stuck with me the most were the profiles on the Northern Alliance (Afghanistan) leader Massoud and the story about Cypress.
Massoud was the one guy on the planet who seemed to get what the Taliban was up to and if people had listened to him 9/11 might not have happened.
The story on Cypress led me to the conclusion that the solution to preventing neighbors from killing each may be to put up a fence and wait a few generations before letting those people interact again.