Susan Sontag, Essays of the 1960s and 1970s: Against Interpretation / Styles of Radical Will / On Photography / Illness as Metaphor / Uncollected Essays, edited by David Rieff (New York: Library of America, 2013).
Susan Sontag, Later Essays: Under the Sign of Saturn / Aids and Its Metaphors / Where the Stress Falls / Regarding the Pain of Others; At the Same Time, edited by David Rieff (New York: Library of America, 2017) (From "On Courage ad Resistance (The Oscar Romero Award Keynote Address): "Every violence in war has been justified as a retaliation. We are threatened. We are defending ourselves. The others, they want to kill us. We must stop them "And from there: we must stop them before they have a chance to carry out their plans. And since those who would attack us are sheltering behind noncombatants, no aspect of civil life can be immune to our depredations. "Never mind the disparity of forces, of wealth, of firepower--or simply of population. . . Not to support those who are coming under fire from the enemy seems like treason. "It may be that, in some cases, the threat is real. In such circumstances, the bearer of the moral principle seems like someone running alongside a moving train, yelling 'Stop! Stop! "Can the train be stopped? No, it can't. At least, not now. "Will other people on the train be moved to jump off and join those on the ground? Maybe some will, but most won't (at least, not until they have a whole new canopy of fears). "The dramaturgy of 'acting on principle' tells us that we don't have to think about whether acting on principle is expedient, or whether we can count on the eventual success of the actions we have undertaken. "Acting on principle is, we're told, a good in itself. "But it is still a political act, in the sense that you're not doing it for yourself. You don't do it just to be in the right or to appease your own conscience; much less because you are confident your action will achieve its aim. You resist as acts of solidarity. With communities of the principled and the disobedient: here, elsewhere. In the present. In the future." Id. at 762, 768-769).
