Except for us, Vesuvius might consume
In solid fire the utmost earth and know
No pain (ignoring the cocks that crow us up
To die). This is a part of the sublime
From which we shrink. And yet, except for us,
The total past felt nothing when destroyed.
– Wallace StevensWe could say that “funk” rests at the root and stem of popular culture in America. From beneath the arms, the crotch, a sensuously fragrant, musky perfume has arisen, activating an affective force that provides for life, enjoyment, enrichment, and regeneration. It is the most natural force in the universe.
– Alfred Pasteur and Ivory L. ToldstonUncle Jam… gave [funk] a metaphysic, proposing that the bottom of the human soul, its base elements one might say, are what makes life a song worth singing. So contrary to the funky-come-latelies, it’s always been possible to have your funk low in the saddle and eat-it-cum-intellectualize-it too. I mean, conceptualizing the funk as mind, body, and soul music ain’t no new type thang — just listen to your “Loose Booty.”
– Greg TateThey learn… how to behave. The careful development of thrift, patience, high morals, and good manners. In short, how to get rid of the funkiness. The dreadful funkiness of passion, the funkiness of nature, the funkiness of the wide range of human emotion. Wherever it erupts, this funk, they wipe it away; where it crests, they dissolve it, wherever it drips, flowers, or clings, they find it and fight it until it dies. They fight this battle all the way to the grave.
– Toni MorrisonThe Specter still will haunt us, in some shape or other: and when driven from our cool Thoughts, and frighted from The Closet, will meet us even at Court.”
– Anthony Ashley Cooper, third Earl of Shaftesbury
Quotes collected from Gothic by Richard Davenport-Hynes and Funk by Rickey Vincent.