Grand Oxymoronic Themes

Grand Oxymoronic Themes is a term I've been using to refer to clusters of powerful oxymoronic and paradoxical ideas. These themes are among the truly Big Ideas of humankind. Indeed, they are so central to the human experience that they're as relevant today as they were when first advanced centuries, even millennia, ago.

A good example of a quotation that fits into a grand oxymoronic theme is:

Since the beginning of civilization, people have dreamed of fame or wealth or other good fortune. Sometimes, prayers appear to be answered and people get what they've long desired. There is, at least for a time, great happiness and cause for celebration. Then, in one of the great ironies of life, a dream-come-true turns into a nightmare. Marriages crumble, families fracture, and personal friendships end with great bitterness. Mother Teresa was obviously thinking along these lines when she once observed:

"More tears are shed over answered prayers than unanswered ones."

In this provocative observation, Mother Teresa reminds us of an ancient paradoxical truth: getting what we want is often the worst thing that can happen to us. The basic idea has been advanced so frequently over the centuries that it deserves to be called a Grand Oxymoronic Theme. The earliest articulation of the idea (at least the earliest I've found) occurs in the 6th century B.C. In one of Aesop's most popular fables, The Old Man and Death, the fabulous fabulist writes:

Writing at around the same time, the Greek philosopher Heraclitus wrote:

"It would not be better for mankind if they were given their desires."

Over the past few decades, I've discovered scores of observations that make the same basic point (you'll see some of them in a moment). At some point, perhaps in a future book, I hope to explore and examine Grand Oxymoronic Themes in more detail. For the purposes of this web site, though, my goal is more modest; it is to simply introduce you to the concept of grand oxymoronic themes and provide you with a dozen or so quotes that illustrate each one. Let's begin with:

 Be careful what you wish for, it might come true

 The sounds of silence