📜 New in the Commonplace Communiqué → 00059 ¶ from Twenty-Two Short Lectures ¶ Mary Ruefle

WHY ALL OUR LITERARY PURSUITS ARE USELESS

Eighty-five percent of all existing species are beetles and various forms of insects.

English is spoken by only 5 percent of the world’s population.

WHY THERE MAY BE HOPE

One of the greatest stories ever written is the story of a man who wakes to find himself transformed into a giant beetle.

Mary Ruefle
—from “Twenty-Two Short Lectures”
—found in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures (2012)