“Responding to the claim that not just reading but "high culture" in general is morally improving, Terry Eagleton points out that, during World War II, "many people were indeed deep in high culture, but . . . this had not… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share Image
“Objections to Christianity... are phrased in words, but that does not mean that they are really a matter of language and analysis and argument.… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“I would not be practicing love toward God OR my neighbour if I were to smile benignly on an unjust social order. It is… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“So let me conclude this chapter with a celebration of splitting--of the disciplined, principled preference for rejecting categories whenever we discern them at work.… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“a first encounter with a worthwhile book is never a complete encounter, and we are usually in error to make it a final one.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“So the books are waiting. Of this you may be confident: they'll be ready when the whim strikes you.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“And yet rereading a book can often be a more significant, dramatic, and, yes, new experience than encountering an unfamiliar work.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“The Virtue and unpretentiousness of the wise man, which I am talking about, goes unnoticed because of its transparent ordinariness.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“Great books are great in part because of what they ask of their readers: they are not readily encountered, easily assessed.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“T. S. Eliot wrote almost a century ago about a phenomenon that he believed to be the product of the nineteenth century: “When there is… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“Christian writers, whether they like it or not, do not simply write for themselves; for good or ill, readers will see their work as… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“The blessing of Google is its uncanny skill in finding what you're looking for; the curse is that it so rarely finds any of… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“Dehaene even allows himself a few moments of (justifiable) annoyance at the way that "childhood reading experts" continue their debates about the best strategies… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“Slow down. Make a point of revisiting passages that seem especially rich, or especially confusing, or for that matter especially offensive.” — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
“For heaven’s sake, don’t turn reading into the intellectual equivalent of eating organic greens, or (shifting the metaphor slightly) some fearfully disciplined appointment with… — Alan Jacobs Copy Share
