My Struggle: Book 6

by Karl Ove Knausgård

everything had its own significance, that was what culture was. The fabric of a pair of trousers was significant, the width of a trouser leg was significant, the pattern in the curtain hung in front of a window was significant, the sudden lowering of a gaze was significant. The particular way a word was pronounced was significant. What a person knew about one thing or another was also significant. Culture charged the world with meaning by establishing differences within it, and those differences, in which everything of value existed, varied from culture to culture. That the units were becoming increasingly bigger, and cultures increasingly similar, was a discouraging thought, at least for someone like me who was fascinated by differences and attracted by impenetrability.