Word: nihilistic
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...ONLY THING that scares a narrow-minded person more than a nihilist is an enthusiast. For, while it has become fashionable to precede many intellectual discussions with a credo of disbelief (in the name of scientific abstraction), the old saw against those who wish to "destroy without first building an alternative system" is a great weapon for the entrenched self-righteous. It is much harder, though, to fight positive enthusiasm. One can do little more than snarl, "naive and simplistic pseudo-philosophy" when confronted with, say, a new religious sect...
...Allen's Annie Hall we see the humorist beginning this metamorphosis. Allen's male friend in the movie represents the Ethical Man of Law, and is in fact, a lawyer. He plays the cosmic straight man to Allen's cosmic nihilism. But Allen is no longer a pure nihilist; he is using this nihilism to affirm himself. Kierkegaard chose the story of Abraham to illustrate this metamorphosis: Abraham must sacrifice his son, Isaac (whose name means "laughter"), to fulfill an unknown Being's absurd and meaningless request...
Allen's making things easy for himself. In Sleeper, it's the futuroids who have beliefs; Allen is the nihilist, spurning art, science, religion, political solutions. Much of the satire in the film arises out of this, and Allen probably really means it when he says he believes only in sex and death. This undercuts some of his punch. The future sets up America's excesses, and Allen knocks them down with simple irreverence, a refusal to take them seriously. There's no room for the subtle snipe when the targets are set up like sitting ducks...
...Vandervane, 54, violinist, composer and conductor, is a familiar Amis character, a clowning nihilist with a middle finger ever at the ready. "Rage at absent, or largely imaginary foes," writes Amis, "was part of his life style...
...journals, like Problemi and Praxis, operate outside the system. This may not be because these writers are so alienated, but because they feel themselves above the activist approach. I spent some time with the bearded director of Problemi in his modest Ljubljana office. He described himself as a "political nihilist, not interested, and not searching for feasible solutions." He admitted that most journals of this sort are too intellectual to have a broad-based appeal...