Assorted quotations

1. “Only a few authors have bothered to approach the disintegration of America in an innovative way.”

2. “They estimated that without antibiotics, one out of every six recipients of new hip joints would die.”

3. “The urban refugees come from all walks of life — businesspeople and artists, teachers and chefs — though there is no reliable estimate of their numbers. They have staked out greener lives in small enclaves, from central Anhui Province to remote Tibet. Many are Chinese bobos, or bourgeois bohemians, and they say that besides escaping pollution and filth, they want to be unshackled from the material drives of the cities — what Ms. Lin derided as a focus on “what you’re wearing, where you’re eating, comparing yourself with others.”  The link is here.

4. “It is the first time that the West has lost a soft power contest with Russia.”

5. “I do take painting seriously,” he said. “It’s changed my life.”