A dictionary of Marshall McLuhan’s quotations

But it was by means of electricity applied to the wheel that the wheel merges once more with animal form. In fact, the wheel is now an obsolete form in the electric-missile age. But hypertrophy is the mark of obsolescence, as we shall see again and again. Just because wheel is now returning to organic form in the twentieth century it is quite easy for us to understand how primitive man “invented” it. Any creature in motion is a wheel in that repetitive form of movement has a cyclic and circular principle in it. Thus the melodies of literate societies are repeatable cycles.
The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man, (1962), p 44
Year: 1962
↪ Also at #1900, #2545, #6820, #6887, #6957
Compiled by William Kuhns
© 2026, The Estate of Marshall McLuhan