241 Quotes by Terry Eagleton

I attacked Dawkins's book on God because I think he is theologically illiterate.

There is an insuperable problem about introducing immigrants to British values. There are no British values. Nor are there any Serbian or Peruvian values. No nation has a monopoly on fairness and decency, justice and humanity.

Anyone can be tolerant of those who are tolerant.

It is in Rousseau's writing above all that history begins to turn from upper-class honour to middle-class humanitarianism. Pity, sympathy and compassion lie at the centre of his moral vision. Values associated with the feminine begin to infiltrate social existence as a whole, rather than being confined to the domestic sphere.

Most poetry in the modern age has retreated to the private sphere, turning its back on the political realm.

You've got to have a sense of different audiences. I'm a kind of performer manque - I come from a long line of failed actors!

Language, identity and forms of life are the terms in which political demands are shaped and voiced.

For the liberal state to accommodate a diversity of beliefs while having few positive convictions is one of the more admirable achievements of civilization.

I liked early Amis a lot, but I stopped reading him some time ago. I admire Hitchens on literary topics - I think he is very astute. McEwan, I read a bit. But I suppose it's more the ideological phenomenon that they represent together that interests me.