One of the questions that has most bothered me in my reflections on culture is the question of kitsch. Just what is it? When did it begin? And why?
Roger ScrutonRead
A reactionary is fixed on the past and wanting to return to it; a conservative wishes to adapt what is best in the past to the changing circumstances of the present.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote contrasts reactionaries and conservatives in their relationship to the past, highlighting a difference in approach to change.
Roger Scruton's quote emphasizes the distinction between reactionaries, who are primarily focused on reverting to a previous state, and conservatives, who seek to adapt valuable lessons from the past to contemporary situations. This illustrates a philosophical debate about how societies can learn from history while also embracing progress.
Themes
ReactionaryConservativePastChangeAdaptation
In practice
Example use cases
This quote could be used in a debate about political ideologies and their impact on society.
More from Roger Scruton
All quotes →There are big questions science doesn't answer, such as why is there something rather than nothing? There can't be a scientific answer to that because it's the answer that precedes science.
Roger ScrutonRead
18th century opera is packed with emotion, but contains not a trace of kitsch. Only with the 'thees' and 'thous' of Victorian poetry does the disease begin to grow in our poetic tradition.
Roger ScrutonRead
The robust English view used to be that the correct response to offensive words is to ignore them, or to answer them with a rebuke. If you invoke the law at all, it should be to protect the one who gives the offence, and not the one who takes it. Now, it seems, it is all the other way round.
Roger ScrutonRead
For two centuries the English countryside has been an icon of national identity and the loved reminder of our island home. Yet the government is bent on littering the hills with wind turbines and the valleys with high speed railways.
Roger ScrutonRead
You cannot own a symphony or a novel in the way you can own a Damien Hirst. As a result there are far fewer fake symphonies or fake novels than there are fake works of visual art.
Roger ScrutonRead
Similar quotes
The Bible says that God has a reason for keeping us here; if He didn't, He would take us to Heaven far sooner.
Billy GrahamRead
They don't ask much of you. They only want you to hate the things you love and to love the things you despise.
Boris PasternakRead
Scandal sells books; fidelity does not.
Coretta Scott KingRead
Everyone in the street where I grew up was given the same message: You can be anything; you can do anything. That wasn't extraordinary; that was ordinary for us. My folks didn't believe in black exceptionalism. There's nothing exceptional about 'You can have that, too' - except when it comes to justice. You can't have that.
Yance FordRead
It is crucial that we develop real awareness of ourselves as citizens of Earth, linked by mutual and indissoluble bonds. When we clearly recognize this reality and ground ourselves in it, we are compelled to take a strict accounting of our way of life.
Daisaku IkedaRead
The perfect knowledge of events cannot be acquired without divine inspiration, since all prophetic inspiration receives its prime motivating force from God the creator, then from good fortune and nature.
NostradamusRead