José Antonio Ramos Sucre

José Antonio Ramos Sucre HOME
José Antonio Ramos Sucre Hailstorm (Extract) I – Reading is an act of servility. – Good is the lesser evil. – Life is a squandering. – Life is an affront; the organism is a web of emunctories. – To live is to die. – God is cruel to the poor. – God lacks practical existence. – God is the relegated and lazy sovereign of a constitutional monarchy, where Satan serves as Prime Minister. – Truth is the fact. – Philosophy sets us up in case we insult it. – Ignorance takes us straight to skepticism, which is the most judicious attitude of our mind. – Science consists of facts and their explanation. The latter are variable and subject to error, but we shouldn’t worry, because error is the principal agent of civilization. – Reputations would impede progress if whisperers didn’t exist. – The word outstanding applied to students: a tag for sheep, a jewel for the insignificant, noise of the anonymous. – Law and art are an amendment of reality by man. – Manners serve to camouflage poor breeding. Urbanity consists of a good mood. – The cultivation of The Liberator. – Aristocracy by birth is autosuggestion. That’s why no one believes in anyone else’s lineage. – Democracy is the aristocracy of ability. – Illustrious surnames give you free reign. – Money is only good for buying. – The bourgeoisie are characterized by the fear of appearing bourgeois. – Schemers tend to display an ostentatious laboriousness. – Work is a devoted exercise that serves the destitute when they try to win the kingdom of heaven. – Grammar exists in order to justify illogical actions of language. – Words are divided into expressive and inexpressive. There are no pure words. – A language is the universe translated into that language. – He who uses irreplaceable expressions is a good writer. – Writers are divided into the boring and the amenable. The first are also called classics. – People of a classical temperament elevate the case to an example and the example to a rule. – The only decent thing to do with history is falsify it. – History is only good for increasing hatred among men. – We must throw history out, use it with the gesture of the maid who, on any given morning, uses a broom to dispense with the corpse of a bat, dirty, black and gloomy critter. – Conservatives are left-handed. – Two doctors can’t face each other without laughing. – It’s possible to classify a people according to the interjections they use. The Romans were simpletons; they would animate each other with inexpressive interjections: io, eheu, papae. – North Americans are alert inventors. They discovered that the purpose of clothing has as its object to dress man, rather than oppress or disguise him. The adoption of the loose neck is another victory of the republic against the ancien régime, a delightful lesson from Benjamin Franklin for the measured courtier of Versailles. That philanthropist wouldn’t rest in the service of his peers after inventing the lightning rod. – Concubinage deserves the best from the republic. It has accelerated the fusion of the Venezuelan races. translated by guillermo parra

Hailstorm

(Extract)

I
– Reading is an act of servility.

– Good is the lesser evil.

– Life is a squandering.

– Life is an affront; the organism is a web of emunctories.

– To live is to die.

– God is cruel to the poor.

– God lacks practical existence.

– God is the relegated and lazy sovereign of a constitutional monarchy, where Satan serves

as Prime Minister.

– Truth is the fact.

– Philosophy sets us up in case we insult it.

– Ignorance takes us straight to skepticism, which is the most judicious attitude of our mind.

– Science consists of facts and their explanation. The latter are variable and subject to error,

but we shouldn’t worry, because error is the principal agent of civilization.

– Reputations would impede progress if whisperers didn’t exist.

– The word outstanding applied to students: a tag for sheep, a jewel for the insignificant, noise of the anonymous.

– Law and art are an amendment of reality by man.

– Manners serve to camouflage poor breeding. Urbanity consists of a good mood.

– The cultivation of The Liberator.

– Aristocracy by birth is autosuggestion. That’s why no one believes in anyone else’s lineage.

– Democracy is the aristocracy of ability.

– Illustrious surnames give you free reign.

– Money is only good for buying.

– The bourgeoisie are characterized by the fear of appearing bourgeois.

– Schemers tend to display an ostentatious laboriousness.

– Work is a devoted exercise that serves the destitute when they try to win the kingdom of heaven.

– Grammar exists in order to justify illogical actions of language.

– Words are divided into expressive and inexpressive. There are no pure words.

– A language is the universe translated into that language.

– He who uses irreplaceable expressions is a good writer.

– Writers are divided into the boring and the amenable. The first are also called classics.

– People of a classical temperament elevate the case to an example and the example to a rule.

– The only decent thing to do with history is falsify it.

– History is only good for increasing hatred among men.

– We must throw history out, use it with the gesture of the maid who, on any given morning, uses a broom to dispense with the corpse of a bat, dirty, black and gloomy critter.

– Conservatives are left-handed.

– Two doctors can’t face each other without laughing.

– It’s possible to classify a people according to the interjections they use. The Romans were simpletons; they would animate each other with inexpressive interjections: io, eheu, papae.

– North Americans are alert inventors. They discovered that the purpose of clothing has as its object to dress man, rather than oppress or disguise him. The adoption of the loose neck is another victory of the republic against the ancien régime, a delightful lesson from Benjamin Franklin for the measured courtier of Versailles. That philanthropist wouldn’t rest in the service of his peers after inventing the lightning rod.

– Concubinage deserves the best from the republic. It has accelerated the fusion of the Venezuelan races.
translated by guillermo parra