"Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence"
About this Quote
The imperative “Never resist” is sly. It sounds like craft advice, but it’s also Baudrillard’s broader fascination with systems that undo our agency. You don’t author the sentence so much as get authored by it. The pleasure is not just aesthetic; it’s a momentary reversal of control, a reminder that meaning can happen without being managed. That’s why “stupefied” matters: it’s not enlightened, it’s dazed. The sentence arrives as an event, not an argument.
Contextually, this sits inside Baudrillard’s suspicion of sincerity and “the real.” Innocence here isn’t naive purity; it’s the uncanny effect of encountering language that hasn’t been fully colonized by intention. After prolonged cynicism, even a simple, alive turn of phrase can register as scandalously fresh - and that freshness, he implies, is exactly what late-modern life makes rare.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Baudrillard, Jean. (2026, January 18). Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/never-resist-a-sentence-you-like-in-which-9161/
Chicago Style
Baudrillard, Jean. "Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence." FixQuotes. January 18, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/never-resist-a-sentence-you-like-in-which-9161/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence." FixQuotes, 18 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/never-resist-a-sentence-you-like-in-which-9161/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.






