"Impatience translates itself into a desire to have something immediate done about it all, and, as is generally the case with impatience, resolves itself in the easiest way that lies ready to hand"
About this Quote
Sapir pins impatience to a familiar political and psychological reflex: when discomfort spikes, agency gets outsourced to the nearest available lever, not the most effective one. The line moves in stages - “translates,” “desire,” “resolves” - tracing how a feeling masquerades as a plan. Impatience doesn’t just want change; it wants the sensation of change, fast. So it reaches for the “easiest way that lies ready to hand,” a phrase that makes convenience sound like destiny.
As a scientist and foundational linguist/anthropologist writing in the early 20th century, Sapir is especially alert to how inner states get converted into social action through language and habit. “Translates itself” is telling: impatience becomes a kind of mistranslation, where urgency is rendered as necessity. The subtext is less about individual temperament than about collective decision-making under stress. When societies feel stuck - economic anxiety, cultural friction, institutional fatigue - they don’t only demand solutions; they demand immediate performances of solution-ness. That’s where scapegoats, simplistic reforms, and punitive crackdowns become attractive: they’re “ready to hand,” requiring less imagination than structural repair.
The sentence also carries a quiet warning about moral laziness. Impatience isn’t framed as passion or conviction; it’s framed as a cognitive shortcut. Sapir’s sting is that the easiest option often wins not because it’s persuasive, but because impatience needs closure. The result is action that soothes the actor more than it addresses the problem.
As a scientist and foundational linguist/anthropologist writing in the early 20th century, Sapir is especially alert to how inner states get converted into social action through language and habit. “Translates itself” is telling: impatience becomes a kind of mistranslation, where urgency is rendered as necessity. The subtext is less about individual temperament than about collective decision-making under stress. When societies feel stuck - economic anxiety, cultural friction, institutional fatigue - they don’t only demand solutions; they demand immediate performances of solution-ness. That’s where scapegoats, simplistic reforms, and punitive crackdowns become attractive: they’re “ready to hand,” requiring less imagination than structural repair.
The sentence also carries a quiet warning about moral laziness. Impatience isn’t framed as passion or conviction; it’s framed as a cognitive shortcut. Sapir’s sting is that the easiest option often wins not because it’s persuasive, but because impatience needs closure. The result is action that soothes the actor more than it addresses the problem.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
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