The Joy of Curmudgeonry

I shall be in Japan until the fourth of July. Thus, no posts until then.

What led Hobsbawm to Marxism? In his own words, “Pity for the exploited, the aesthetic appeal of a perfect and comprehensive intellectual sy...

One may fairly suppose that, when it comes to the winning of power, even the most ardent of socialists would not wish to abolish the brisk t...

It is almost impossible to persuade a fool of the rationality or truth of a matter if upon that same matter some genius has averred to the c...

Today I am reminded that bad old ideas never die, they just eke out a sordid and valetudinous existence in The Guardian . Therein George Mo...

In ideological struggle, the scoundrel wishes to make known that all great thinkers are essentially on his side, so that it appears that the...

One might have thought that a derangement of the mental faculties would be of some disadvantage to an intellectual career, had one not time ...

All socially aware people have long suspected it, the line-up at the upcoming Live 8 concerts has highlighted it, but now a report to be rel...

The search for the grounds for ignorance has been no less exhaustive than that for knowledge. The old Socratic maxim stated that wisdom cons...

Imagine a world in which the philistines controlled art. Ugliness, tastelessness, and tat would reign. Whatever was fiscally, politically or...

The New Criterion declares that it has been a great year for academic absurdity, a subject close to my spleen. ..... I look at intellectual...

Sir Elton John is quoted in The Guardian today: When the Live Aid concert happened 20 years ago I was pretty much a self-obsessed drug addi...

More pretentious twaddle ( The Nation, 15th June 2005 issue ) from the prolifically profligate Professor Eagleton: The future is already pot...