Mark Helprin Quote

Every city has its gates, which need not be of stone. Nor need soldiersbe upon them or watchers before them. At first, when cities were jewels in adark and mysterious world, they tended to be round and they had protectivewalls. To enter, one had to pass through gates, the reward for which wasshelter from the overwhelming forests and seas, the merciless and taxingexpanse of greens, whites, and blues - wild and free - that stopped at thecity walls.In time, the ramparts became higher and the gates more massive, until theysimply disappeared and were replaced by barriers, subtler than stone, thatgirded every city like a crown and held in its spirit. Some claim that thebarriers do not exist, and disparage them. Although they themselves canpenetrate the new walls with no effort, their spirits (which, also, theyclaim do not exist) cannot, and are left like orphans around the periphery.To enter a city intact it is necessary to pass through one of the new gates.They are far more difficult to find than their solid predecessors, for theyare tests, mechanisms, devices, and implementations of justice.

Mark Helprin

Every city has its gates, which need not be of stone. Nor need soldiersbe upon them or watchers before them. At first, when cities were jewels in adark and mysterious world, they tended to be round and they had protectivewalls. To enter, one had to pass through gates, the reward for which wasshelter from the overwhelming forests and seas, the merciless and taxingexpanse of greens, whites, and blues - wild and free - that stopped at thecity walls.In time, the ramparts became higher and the gates more massive, until theysimply disappeared and were replaced by barriers, subtler than stone, thatgirded every city like a crown and held in its spirit. Some claim that thebarriers do not exist, and disparage them. Although they themselves canpenetrate the new walls with no effort, their spirits (which, also, theyclaim do not exist) cannot, and are left like orphans around the periphery.To enter a city intact it is necessary to pass through one of the new gates.They are far more difficult to find than their solid predecessors, for theyare tests, mechanisms, devices, and implementations of justice.

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About Mark Helprin

Mark Helprin (Hebrew: מארק הלפרין; born June 28, 1947) is an American-Israeli novelist, journalist, conservative commentator, Senior Fellow of the Claremont Institute for the Study of Statesmanship and Political Philosophy, Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, and Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. While Helprin's fictional works straddle a number of disparate genres and styles, he has stated that he "belongs to no literary school, movement, tendency, or trend".