:. The decline of the paradigm of travelling as a metaphor of the path towards a form of achievement. Only a simulacrum, a fetiche of this metaphor is left. The river spirit has dried out, while the current is now stagnating over the body. This results in the wearing out of the very concept of formation, of progress, of research, at the moment when it does not take any object for granted, nor does it presume any imaginative content or goal. What is left if the movement as a repetition, as a coercion to proceed: what is left is the formula, the act of searching for the sake of searching itself, the training.
The Western soul has come to such a level of formalization, of structuring and scaffolding, that it is impossible to recognise one’s contents nor one’s own imagery any longer. The soul has changed them into modules, as it is convinced that only their reiterated usage is capable of producing meaning. The sophistication of contents into prototypes empties them of their propulsive potential, by stopping their engine. George Steiner wrote that societies in decay are those who are no more able to produce dreams about themselves.

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