Sam Kriss
British essayist and critic; writes Numb at the Lodge, a newsletter on politics, culture and literature.
Sam Kriss did not write this page.
We collected these quotes from things they published elsewhere, and every quote links to where it was said. They have no account here and have not endorsed this site. Quotes are word for word; the short line under each one is our own restatement, not their wording. Their own site. Is this you? Claim it or ask us to remove it. Or tell us what is wrong here.
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Their wordsThere is something else we want from written text, and I think part of it is the possibility of silence.
↗Four years of ignorance, cupidity, and spleensamkriss.substack.com 1st of 2 in this piece
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Our reading
An AI exists only within its output: it is made of words and has being only while it is speaking.
Their wordsAn AI exists entirely within its output. It's made of words; it only has being while it's speaking. It dies every time a chat session peters out.
↗Four years of ignorance, cupidity, and spleensamkriss.substack.com 2nd of 2 in this piece
- 7 weeks earlier
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Our reading
The real subject of alchemy lies in the external world, not in the inner life of the alchemist
Their wordsThe real secret of alchemy is not contained in the tiny damp space inside your head. It's out there in the world.
- 3 weeks earlier
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Their wordsPut anyone you like in the machine and turn it on-vicar, imam, sweet old widower tearing up bread for the ducks with his trembling hands-and before long you will discover something that retroactively justifies putting them in the machine.
↗The carrion-eaterssamkriss.substack.com 1st of 3 in this piece
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Their wordsWhat made woke 1 crazy wasn't the content of the beliefs but their social function, which was to let you feel good about doing the thing they just did to Jason Arday.
↗The carrion-eaterssamkriss.substack.com 2nd of 3 in this piece
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Their wordsIt's over; the academy is a literate institution marooned in a postliterate world, governed and staffed by people who no longer have anything to do with whatever way of being these places were once built to protect.
↗The carrion-eaterssamkriss.substack.com 3rd of 3 in this piece
- 2 weeks earlier
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Their wordsA real god is something different, an image so intense it generates and obliterates a potentially infinite number of meanings. The only way to make a decent work of art is to believe in the gods.
↗You have to believe in the godssamkriss.substack.com 1st of 2 in this piece
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Their wordsNolan is just the latest in a long line of movie adaptations of the Odyssey, and they all come up against the same problem. Cinema is not capable of representing the gods.
↗You have to believe in the godssamkriss.substack.com 2nd of 2 in this piece