Quotes by Joseph Epstein

“The study of the past is the main portal through which culture is acquired.”

“The English philosopher Michael Oakeshott notes that one of the signs of being cold today is that one knows what one doesn't have to know.”

“For reasons no one has yet explained, the Internet is at once riveting and a great killer of concentration.”

“The acquisition of culture requires repose, sitting quietly in a room with a book, or alone with one's thoughts even any crowded concert or art museum.”

“Vladimir Nabokov, contemning readers who "identified" with characters in fiction, remarked that the best readers identify with the artist.”

“Conservatives and those on the right are usually willing to settle for thinking themselves correct on political issues; those on the left have always needed to feel not so much that they are correc...”

“[Snobbishness] is the desire for what divides men and the inability to value what unites them.”

“Those who consider themselves good teachers probably aren't.”

“Not to like ice cream is to show oneself uninterested in food.”

“Culture means, I think, that you have widened your experience enough through reading and through being a little bit thoughtful about these things that it has changed your outlook in some ways. And ...”

“It is difficult to be ambitious without also being envious.”

“There is no word equivalent to 'cuckold' for women.”

“It is difficult to be ambitious without also being envious.”