In other books, including excellent ones by John Lukacs as well as Churchill's own, Churchill fights his way through the encompassing darkness of that time.
Schubert's Winterreise, depicting a poet's winter's journey, perfectly captures the cold and darkness of this time of year.
As he states: "The question of images is at the heart of the great darkness of our time, the 'discontent of our civilization.' We must know how to look into images to see that of which they are survivors.
Gay marriage was, along with homosexuality, something the first Christians faced as part of the pagan moral darkness of their time.
And in the darkness of that time, it became clear to me I was at a crossroads of life: I could either A) choose to finish the job my body had started and let myself die (no metaphor here), which frankly would've been the easier option, or B) I could choose to start from scratch and rebuild my body and life in a healthy, conscientious, strategic and very careful way.
The "mental darkness" of earlier times is done, Douglass reminded his audience.
But even though the show was a comedy, its mood was informed by the darkness of the times and the troubles of New York City, where it was set.
Otherwise, the staging, with minimal scenery and dim lighting, rendered the darkness of the times, then and now, with grim accuracy.
In the twilight and darkness of dinner-time I have seen pizza, Chinese and other foods hauled on delivery bikes zipping the wrong way in bicycle lanes and against streams of both two-way and-one-way traffic, hopping onto sidewalks and flying through pedestrian walkways within building clusters.
There were daffodils on the street medians here and glints of spring sunshine, reminders that the hours of darkness at this time of year are also being met and battled by hours of light.
It is seen as a time of balance before the descent into the darkness of winter, a time to take stock of the fruits of the harvest and of things achieved in life.
