"It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle"
About this Quote
Gide is smuggling a contrarian work ethic into a sentence that sounds almost like advice. The modern self-help gospel insists that obstacles yield to sheer persistence, that character is forged by “plugging away.” Gide, the novelist of moral sidesteps and psychological double-backs, calls that bluff. He suggests difficulty isn’t a locked door you batter down; it’s a wall with a loose brick three feet over.
The intent is practical but also quietly insurgent: stop treating problems as moral tests. Sometimes directness is vanity disguised as virtue - the belief that if you just try harder, reality must comply. Gide’s “often” does the heavy lifting, puncturing absolutism without turning indirection into a new dogma. He’s advocating for lateral motion: change the adjacent variable, shift the frame, re-sequence the task, let the knot loosen when you stop yanking the same strand.
The subtext about “some people” is sharper. In relationships, argument and persuasion rarely work head-on because the “difficulty” is identity, not logic. People defend themselves against frontal approaches; they can be met, however, through shared side doors: a story, a joke, a smaller request, a change in environment, the slow accrual of trust. “Obliquely” isn’t cowardice here; it’s emotional intelligence with a hint of manipulation, the admission that influence travels on angles.
Contextually, Gide’s era - and his own life - makes the line land. A writer navigating bourgeois propriety, desire, and public morality learned that the straight path is often blocked, while the diagonal remains passable. This is strategy as sensibility: not surrendering, just refusing the romance of the head-on fight.
The intent is practical but also quietly insurgent: stop treating problems as moral tests. Sometimes directness is vanity disguised as virtue - the belief that if you just try harder, reality must comply. Gide’s “often” does the heavy lifting, puncturing absolutism without turning indirection into a new dogma. He’s advocating for lateral motion: change the adjacent variable, shift the frame, re-sequence the task, let the knot loosen when you stop yanking the same strand.
The subtext about “some people” is sharper. In relationships, argument and persuasion rarely work head-on because the “difficulty” is identity, not logic. People defend themselves against frontal approaches; they can be met, however, through shared side doors: a story, a joke, a smaller request, a change in environment, the slow accrual of trust. “Obliquely” isn’t cowardice here; it’s emotional intelligence with a hint of manipulation, the admission that influence travels on angles.
Contextually, Gide’s era - and his own life - makes the line land. A writer navigating bourgeois propriety, desire, and public morality learned that the straight path is often blocked, while the diagonal remains passable. This is strategy as sensibility: not surrendering, just refusing the romance of the head-on fight.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
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