When Words Run Out

Two phrases have been rattling around in my head:

Muss man schweigen — “One must be silent.”

Against Interpretation — the title of Susan Sontag’s essay.

Both are about words, or rather, about what happens when words get in the way.

The German phrase comes from Wittgenstein: “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” He meant that language has limits. Some things can’t be captured in sentences, and trying only makes them smaller.

Sontag, on the other hand, was frustrated with art criticism. In Against Interpretation, she said critics were dissecting art into symbols and meanings until the life was drained out.

In an age of endless commentary — hot takes, reviews, breakdowns — maybe we need both. To pause before explaining everything. To let silence, or raw feeling, have its place.

I’ve started trying it:

Watching a sunset without narrating it.

Listening to a song without analyzing it.

It feels like breathing space.