"I see," said Ellie. "Not a necessary condition. But do feelings really have an agenda?"
She supposed they did. Happiness bred happiness as contempt bred contempt. And so on, and so on, forever. "I like to think of the function of art as residing in intent -- but we are all puppets of culture. It's hard to say whose intent is whose."
Ellie laughed. "A rebel, you are."
This isn't so bad. See, you've been having a conversation for more than ten minutes. He doesn't even mind.
She took the book quietly, hands and expression both steady and calm, though once Evan smiled she found herself mirroring him again. "People conform themselves to structure without meaning to -- then they become part of the structure, and their behavior follows accordingly. To survive as a unit, rather than an individual; they become different people alone."
Just as I must have.
"I lived here, in New York. My father and his family are all from Ithaca, though -- he taught at Cornell. Literature. When he wasn't traveling with mom."