““In the at least three-thousand-year-old struggle between Pentheus and Dionysus— between popes and dancing peasants, between Puritans and carnival-goers, between missionaries and the practitioners of indigenous ecstatic danced religions — Pentheus and his allies seem to have finally prevailed. Not only has the possibility of collective joy been largely marginalized to the storefront churches of the poor and the darkened clubs frequented by the young, but the very source of this joy—other people, including strangers—no longer holds much appeal.””
