Leslie Fiedler :
To be an American (unlike being English or French or whatever) is precisely to imagine a destiny rather than to inherit one; since we have always been, insofar as we are Americans at all, inhabitants of myth rather than history.
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America
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Freedom
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Power
Gift it
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=8285&author=Leslie Fiedler"e=++To+be+an+American+%28unlike+being+English+or+French+or+whatever%29+is+precisely+to+imagine+a+destiny+rather+than+to+inherit+one%3B+since+we+have+always+been%2C+insofar+as+we+are+Americans+at+all%2C+inhabitants+of+myth+rather+than+history.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F3125%2FLeslie+Fiedler_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=50513&author=Irwin Edman"e=The+standardized+American+is+largely+a+myth+created+not+least+by+Americans+themselves.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F4901%2FIrwin+Edman_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=98765&author=Natalie Merchant"e=There+is+one+tradition+in+America+I+am+proud+to+inherit.+It+is+our+first+freedom+and+the+truest+expression+of+our+Americanism%3A+the+ability+to+dissent+without+fear.+It+is+our+right+to+utter+the+words%2C+%22I+disagree.%22+We+must+feel+at+liberty+to+speak+those+words+to+our+neighbors%2C+our+clergy%2C+our+educators%2C+our+news+media%2C+our+lawmakers+and%2C+above+all%2C+to+the+one+among+us+we+elect+President.%0A&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F14580%2FNatalie+Merchant_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=72051&author=Pearl S Buck"e=It+is+a+shameful+sign+of+our+arrogance+that+our+history+departments+have+almost+no+Chinese+history+in+them%2C+our+literature+courses+almost+no+Chinese+literature%2C+our+philosophy+departments+almost+none+of+the+great+Chinese+systems+of+philosophy.+And+our+religious+schools+have+been+the+most+arrogant+of+all.%0AThis+ignorant+arrogant+mind+has+become+fixed+in+its+patterns.+It+is+the+pattern+which+considers+anything+not+American+to+be+inferior+%E2%80%94+unless+it+be+English.%0A&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F13095%2FPearl+S_Buck_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=79753&author=E L Doctorow"e=History+is+the+present.+That%E2%80%99s+why+every+generation+writes+it+anew.+But+what+most+people+think+of+as+history+is+its+end+product%2C+myth.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F9054%2FE++L+Doctorow_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=20071&author=Eugene Ionesco"e=++There+is+nothing+truer+than+myth%3A+history%2C+in+its+attempt+to+realize+myth%2C+distorts+it%2C+stops+halfway%3B+when+history+claims+to+have+succeeded%2C+this+is+nothing+but+humbug+and+mystification.+Everything+we+dream+is+realizable.+Reality+does+not+have+to+be%3A+it+is+simply+what+it+is.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2Fimages_web%2Fauthor_no_icon.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=73168&author=Julia Cameron"e=For+most+of+us%2C+the+seductive+and+unstated+part+of+%22if+I+had+enough+time%22+is+the+unstated+sentence+%22to+hear+myself+think.%22+In+other+words%2C+we+imagine+that+if+we+had+time+we+would+quiet+our+more+shallow+selves+and+listen+to+a+deeper+flow+of+inspiration.+Again%2C+this+is+a+myth+that+lets+us+off+the+hook%E2%80%94+if+I+wait+for+enough+time+to+listen%2C+I+don%27t+have+to+listen+now%2C+I+don%27t+have+to+take+responsibility+for+what+is+trying+to+bubble+up+today.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F13537%2FJulia_Cameron_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=16439&author=Wallace Stevens"e=++Nothing+could+be+more+inappropriate+to+American+literature+than+its+English+source+since+the+Americans+are+not+British+in+sensibility.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F1397%2FWallace_Stevens_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=73033&author=James Branch Cabell"e=Surely+the+cosmic+irony+that+loves+men%27s+dullness+because+it+alone+can+preserve+them+from+madness%2C+and+retorts+upon+the+cosmic+terrors+with+a+jest%2C+is+higher+than+gallantry+and+more+enduring.+It+arrives+at+tolerance+for+all+human+shortcomings%3B+it+embraces+high+and+low+in+its+sympathies%3B+it+achieves+urbanity+as+a+final+goal.+It+is+the+stuff+of+which+great+literature+is+made.+And+Mr.+Cabell+is+creating+great+literature.+A+self-reliant+intellectual%2C+rich+in+the+spoils+of+all+literatures%2C+one+of+the+great+masters+of+English+prose%2C+the+supreme+comic+spirit+thus+far+granted+us%2C+he+stands+apart+from+the+throng+of+lesser+American+novelists%2C+as+Mark+Twain+stood+apart%2C+individual+and+incomparable.%0A&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F2398%2FJames+Branch+Cabell_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=52236&author=Charles Baudelaire"e=You+may+be+sure+that+the+Americans+will+commit+all+the+stupidities+they+can+think+of%2C+plus+some+that+are+beyond+imagination.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F95%2FCharles_Baudelaire_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=86357&author=Dag Hammarskjöld"e=Destiny+is+something+not+be+to+desired+and+not+to+be+avoided.+A+mystery+not+contrary+to+reason%2C+for+it+implies+that+the+world%2C+and+the+course+of+human+history%2C+have+meaning.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2Fimages_web%2Fauthor_no_icon.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=16317&author=Leslie Fiedler"e=++Unless+criticism+refuses+to+take+itself+quite+so+seriously+or+at+least+to+permit+its+readers+not+to%2C+it+will+inevitably+continue+to+reflect+the+finicky+canons+of+the+genteel+tradition+and+the+depressing+pieties+of+the+Culture+Religion+of+Modernism.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F3125%2FLeslie+Fiedler_64x64.png){kind=link}
![Powerpoint](http://www.iwise.com/downloadPPT.php?quote_id=16318&author=Leslie Fiedler"e=++The+text+is+merely+one+of+the+contexts+of+a+piece+of+literature%2C+its+lexical+or+verbal+one%2C+no+more+or+less+important+than+the+sociological%2C+psychological%2C+historical%2C+anthropological+or+generic.&image=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iwise.com%2FauthorIcons%2F3125%2FLeslie+Fiedler_64x64.png){kind=link}