Better person Quote by Alan Jacobs
““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 prevented some of them from engaging in such activities as superintending the murder of Jews in central Europe." If reading really was supposed to "make you a better person," then "when the Allied troops moved into the concentration camps . . . to arrest commandants who had whiled away their leisure hours with a volume of Goethe, it appeared that someone had some explaining to do." So nothing about reading, or listening to Mozart sonatas, or viewing paintings by Raphael necessarily transforms or even improves someone's character. As the eighteenth-century scientist G. C. Lichtenberg once wrote, "A book is like a mirror: if an ass looks in, you can't expect an apostle to look out." Nevertheless, I am going to argue . . . that if you really want to become a better person, there are ways in which reading can help. But the degree to which that happens will depend not just on what you read . . . but also why and how.””
About This Quote
Source Essay: “The Moral Limits of Reading,” 2018
Reading alone does not guarantee moral improvement; the impact depends on the reader’s intentions, context, and critical engagement with the material.
In simple terms: Reading isn’t automatically moral; purpose matters.
Key Takeaway
Read critically, not just for exposure.
Themes
ethics
education
literature
critical thinking
Mood
analytical
inquisitive
Type
philosophical
argumentative
When to use this quote
- Academic discourse
- personal development
- cultural criticism
Key Concepts
Moral philosophy
cognitive impact
Questions to Reflect On
- What motivates your reading choices?
- How can reading foster ethical growth?
A Different Perspective
Assumes all reading is neutral, ignoring systemic influences.
![“[Albert]Camus had denounced the gulag and Stalin's trials. Today we can see that he was right. To say that there were concentration camps in the USSR at the time was blasphemous, something very serious indeed. Today we think about the USSR with the camps also in mind, but before it just wasn't…” quote by Catherine Camus](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/7d9/catherine-camus-12238_camps_albert-camus-had-denounced-the-gulag-and_163819.jpg)
