“It is not the literal past that rules us, save, possibly, in a biological sense. It is images of the past.... Each new historical era mirrors itself in the picture and active mythology of its past or of a past borrowed from other cultures. It tests its sense of identity, of regress or new achievement against that past.”
—George Steiner (b. 1929)
“Style a tablet at every noon time, Lady,
With bold images of a timid boy!”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“It is not the literal past, the “facts” of history, that shape us, but images of the past embodied in language.”
—Brian Friel (b. 1929)