Craigart14

Well, I just glanced at it, but I think it's from "How To Get Atheists to Jump Through Hoops," by Camus, the Killer Whale.

Craig

RED DAVE

To get back to serious fun, spin's breakdown argues a very structured piece.

So, we seem to be looking at a confessional remark in a piece that is poetically structured. I opt for some kind an update of, say, GMark.

RED DAVE

Clivedurdle

If it is Mark, that means Homer is a possible predecessor.

robto

OK, Chris, this has been great fun, but the other shoe has to drop sometime...

Chris Weimer

That's all?

HeretiKc

Hint, plz--I'm not seeing this resolved any time soon without one.

Chris Weimer

Ask the others. Surely you don't think that no one is on the right track, do you? Scroll up (or down, depending on how you view IIDB) and see what the others are saying.

Do we have a consensus yet?

hatsoff

The more I think about this the more I tend to suppose it is a 20th century work--perhaps even late 20th century. At first I likened it to something in the genre of Collier (who was British-born, but wrote and published in America) or Miller, during their early years (30s-40s). However, the pseudo-philosophical meanderings suggest something far less developed, by an author who has been mislead into overestimating his own insights. I wonder if it is something out of The Night Thoreau Spent In Jail (1971), or some similar liberally-edged socio-political commentary.

I remain convinced the passage is original English, not a translation. I am fairly certain it is American, though British origin is not out of the question. I still maintain that it could not possibly pre-date the 18th century. It may be a 19th century work, but I now strongly lean towards an early-to-mid-20th century date.

smokester

Sounds like Friedrich Nietzsche to me.

RED DAVE

Very strange, non-English sentence.

RED DAVE