More than a century ago, Leo Tolstoy experienced the effects of “modernity” in the circle of wealthy, upper-class Russians who made up his world. In that world, he relates, “My life came to a standstill. I could breathe, eat, drink, and sleep, and I could not help doing these things; but there was no life, for there were no wishes the fulfillment of which I could consider reasonable.” “Had a fairy come and offered to fulfill my desires,” he continues, “I should not have known what to ask.”4 This is exactly the world of pointless activity portrayed in such staples of the contemporary American
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