People simplify 'Apollonian' into 'mild', and 'calm', and 'cool'. But 'Apollonian' and 'Dionysian' are two sides of one coin--a nun kneeling in her cell, holding perfectly still, can be in ecstacy more frenzied than any priestess of Pan Priapus celebrating the vernal equinox.

Robert A. Heinlein
About This Quote

The Greek god of wine, fertility and revelry is the god of wildness and freedom. He is the wild god of the woods, the god of eroticism, the god of madness; he is also the god of 'madness'. When we perceive nature as wild, she is given the power to enter into us and shake us with her strength. This is Dionysus. 'Dionysian' means 'mad' or 'of wine' but also means 'to make drunk' - the drink gets us drunk with nature's wildness!

Source: Stranger In A Strange Land

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