Academics From The United Kingdom

"When a court determines any question with respect to ... the upbringing of a child ... the child's welfare shall be the court's paramount consideration. ~ Section 1(1) Children Act 1989"

"Nations are never virtuous, though they might sometimes think they are."

"We know so little about each other. We lie mostly submerged, like ice floes, with our visible social selves projecting only cool and white."

"On a recent Sunday evening, Theo came up with an aphorism: the bigger you think, the crappier it looks. Asked to explain he said, "When we go on about the big things, the political situation, global warming, world poverty, it all looks really terrible, with nothing getting better, nothing to look forward to. But when I think small, closer in – you know, a girl I've just met, or this song we're going to do with Chas, or snowboarding next month, then it looks great. So this is going to be my motto – think small.""

"This is how the entire course of a life can be changed - by doing nothing."

"He had once felt light on the ground. He used to think his life was an open-ended adventure, he used to give things away, it amused him when the unexpected happened, benevolent coincidences used to bear him along. When had all that stopped?"

"You want a picture of futility? It's a tunnel in the desert, from nowhere to nowhere, four hundred and fifty feet long."

"I did not kill my father, but I sometimes felt I had helped him on his way."

"Nearby, where the main road forked, stood an iron cross on a stone base. As the English couple watched, a mason was cutting in half a dozen fresh names. On the far side of the street, in the deep shadow of a doorway, a youngish woman in black was also watching. She was so pale they assumed at first she had some sort of wasting disease. She remained perfectly still, with one hand holding an edge of her headscarf so that it obscured her mouth. The mason seemed embarrassed and kept his back to her while he worked. After a quarter of an hour an old man in blue workman's clothes came shuffling along in carpet slippers and took her hand without a word and led her away. When the propriétaire came out he nodded at the other side of the street, at the empty space and murmured, 'Trois. Mari et deux frères,' as he set down their salads.This sombre incident remained with them as they struggled up the hill in the heat, heavy with lunch, towards the Bergerie de Tédenat. They stopped half way up in the shade of a stand of pines before a long stretch of open ground. Bernard was to remember this moment for the rest of his life. As they drank from their water bottles he was struck by the recently concluded war not as a historical, geopolitical fact but as a multiplicity, a near-infinity of private sorrows, as a boundless grief minutely subdivided without diminishment among individuals who covered the continent like dust, like spores whose separate identities would remain unknown, and whose totality showed more sadness than anyone could ever begin to comprehend; a weight borne in silence by hundreds of thousands, millions, like the woman in black for a husband and two brothers, each grief a particular, intricate, keening love story that might have been otherwise. It seemed as though he had never thought about the war before, not about its cost. He had been so busy with the details of his work, of doing it well, and his widest view had been of war aims, of winning, of statistical deaths, statistical destruction, and of post-war reconstruction. For the first time he sensed the scale of the catastrophe in terms of feeling; all those unique and solitary deaths, all that consequent sorrow, unique and solitary too, which had no place in conferences, headlines, history, and which had quietly retired to houses, kitchens, unshared beds, and anguished memories. This came upon Bernard by a pine tree in the Languedoc in 1946 not as an observation he could share with June but as a deep apprehension, a recognition of a truth that dismayed him into silence and, later, a question: what possible good could come of a Europe covered in this dust, these spores, when forgetting would be inhuman and dangerous, and remembering a constant torture?"

"Who you get, and how it works out - there's so much luck involved, as well as the million branching consequences of your unconscious choice of mate, that no one and no amount of talking can untangle it if it turns out unhappily."

"We went to a club where singers and stand-up comedians performed in the hope of being discovered. A thin girl with bright red hair and sequined T-shirt reached the end of her passionately murmured song on a sudden shrill, impossible top note. All conversation ceased. Someone, perhaps maliciously, dropped a glass. Halfway through, the note became a warbling vibrato and the singer collapsed on the stage in an abject curtsy, arms held stiffly in front of her, fists clenched. Then she sprang to her tiptoes and held her arms high above her head with the palms flat as if to forestall the sporadic and indifferent applause."They all want to be Barbra Streisand or Liza Minnelli," George explained as he sucked a giant cocktail through a pink plastic straw. "But no one's looking for that kind of stuff anymore.""

"Ian McEwan: I guess my starting point would be: the brain is responsible for consciousness, and we can be reasonably sure that when that brain ceases to be—when it falls apart and decomposes—that will be the end of us. From that, quite a lot of things follow, especially morally. We are the very privileged owners of a brief spark of consciousness, and we therefore have to take responsibility for it. We cannot rely, as Christians or Muslims do, on a world elsewhere, a paradise, to which one can work towards and maybe make sacrifices—and, crucially, make sacrifices of other people. We have a marvellous gift, and you see it develop in children, this ability to become aware that other people have minds just like your own and feelings that are just as important as your own, and this gift of empathy seems to me to be the building block of our moral system.Richard Dawkins: I profoundly agree with you, and I've always felt that one of the things that is wrong with religion is that it teaches us to be satisfied with answers which are not really answers at all.Ian McEwan: And if you have a sacred text that tells you how the world began or what the relationship is between this sky-god and you, it does curtail your curiosity, it cuts off a source of wonder. The loveliness of the world in its wondrousness is not apparent to me in Islam or Christianity and all the other major religions."

"Now, I'm an atheist. I really don't believe for a moment that our moral sense comes from a God. … It's human, universal, [it's] being able to think our way into the minds of others. As I said at the time, what those holy fools clearly lacked, or clearly were able to deny themselves, was the ability to enter into the minds of the people they were being so cruel to. Amongst their crimes was a failure of the imagination, of the moral imagination."

"It is easier for eight or nine elderly men to feel their way towards unanimity if they are not compelled to conduct their converging maneuvers under the microscopes and telescopes of the press, but are permitted to shuffle about a little in slippers."

"I can see … only one safe rule for the historian: that he should recognize in the development of human destinies the play of the contingent and the unforeseen."

"All political decisions are taken under great pressure, and if a treaty serves its turn for ten or twenty years, the wisdom of its framers is sufficiently confirmed."

"Purity of race does not exist. Europe is a continent of energetic mongrels."

"Politics is the art of human happiness."

"The hypocrite may serve, among other things, as a deformed ambassador of the truth. By so obviously misrepresenting the truth, he enables us to trace its smothered outlines."

"The big contemporary novel is a perpetual motion machine that appears to have been embarrassed into velocity. It seems to want to abolish stillness, as if ashamed of silence. Stories and sub-stories sprout on every page, and these novels continually flourish their glamorous congestion."

"An excess of storytelling has become the contemporary way of shrouding, in majesty, a lack; it is the Sun King principle. The lack is the human."

"So I approach the date on which my story of the Fifty Years Revolution begins. The old world ended, with its strange mixture of beauty and ugliness, happiness and sorrow, good and evil—so much to be proud of; so much, looking back, of which perhaps to be ashamed. Yet the most rabid radical or the most caustic critic of the Britain that had fought and won a twenty-year battle for freedom a century before, that for a hundred years had helped to keep the peace of the world, and spread civilisation to its distant corners, cannot but feel that if, in this sequence of rapid change, much has been gained, something, too, has been lost."

"Of one thing I was glad. It was not an election fought on "Tranquillity"; it was an election fought upon a positive plan—protection against cheap industrial imports threatening British wage standards and jobs. Baldwin's message was easy to explain to those already unemployed or in fear of unemployment. Cheap imports were beginning to flood into the country, even of billets and bars, still more of manufactured iron and steel products. Surely we needed a tariff, if only for bargaining with other countries. Thus it was not difficult to preach protection with sincerity. I felt all the time that our policy attracted many trade unionists who would only not vote for us because of pressure or a false sense of solidarity. After all, before the rise of the Labour Party, the working class had traditionally been Tory; the tradesmen, the shopkeepers, and the middle classes had generally been Liberal... Meanwhile, the memory of massive unemployment began to haunt me then and for many years to come."

"Best of all was the summer term of 1914, more than two years before greats (the final school) had to be faced; a term, therefore, devoted almost wholly to enjoyment. It was, as so often again in a year of dramatic events, a perfect English summer. Oxford, not yet an industrial town or crowded with the buildings which science has brought in its train, was hardly changed from the Oxford of past centuries. The only concession to modernity (apart from the railway, which was some way from the town) were the trams. But these were horse-drawn. All that summer we punted on the river, bathed, sat in the quad, dined and argued with our friends, debated in the Union, danced at the Commemoration Balls."

"So what did they do? They solemnly asked Parliament, not to approve or disapprove, but to 'take note' of our decision. Perhaps some of the older ones among you will remember that popular song: 'She didn't say "Yes", she didn't say "No". She didn't say "stay", she didn't say "go". She wanted to climb, but dreaded to fall, she bided her time and clung to the wall.'"

"It's a good thing to be laughed at. It's better than to be ignored."

"The introduction after the First War by Lloyd George's Government of a national system of unemployment relief, however circumscribed by various rules and conditions, undoubtedly saved us from something like revolution when the Great Depression came."

"So there you are – you can see what it is like. The camera's hot, probing eye, these monstrous machines and their attendants – a kind of twentieth century torture chamber, that's what it is. But I must try to forget about that, and imagine that you are sitting here in the room with me."

"Nonsense, there are no clubs around Victoria."

"The most striking of all the impressions I have formed since I left London a month ago is of the strength of this African national consciousness. In different places it may take different forms but it is happening everywhere. The wind of change is blowing through this continent. Whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact. We must all accept it as a fact. Our national policies must take account of it. This means, I would judge, that we must come to terms with it. I sincerely believe that if we cannot do so we may imperil the precarious balance between East and West on which the peace of the world depends."

"I rather enjoy patronage. I take a lot of trouble over it. At least it makes all those years of reading Trollope seem worthwhile."

"In later years I was to find economists and newspaper editors arguing against the principle of full employment, to which after the Second War all political parties attached so much importance. While I recognise the dangers of "over-employment", I have little sympathy with those who, writing from pleasant suburban retreats or comfortable editorial chairs, dilate upon the disciplinary values of pre-war conditions. It was my fate to live with the problems of heavy unemployment for fifteen years. They were not substantially eased by any conscious effort either in the industrial or economic field. Rearmament under Hitler's pressure and ultimately under war brought their own grim solution."

"If inflation priced us out of world markets we should be back in the old nightmare of unemployment. What folly to risk throwing away all that we have gained... Our first duty at a time when there is more money about than goods to spend it on is to keep down Government expenditure... The second duty of the Government is to frame policies which encourage saving and discourage spending... [I]n the long run there is only one answer to the 64,000 dollar question—to increase production. That is the answer. That is where the real hope lies."

"It is always a matter of regret from the personal point of view when divergences arise between colleagues, but it is the team that matters and not the individual, and I am quite happy about the strength and the power of the team, and so I thought the best thing to do was to settle up these little local difficulties, and then turn to the wider vision of the Commonwealth."

"I'd like that translated, if I may."

"Indeed, let us be frank about it. Most of our people have never had it so good. Go around the country, go to the industrial towns, go to the farms, and you will see a state of prosperity such as we have never had in my life time—nor indeed ever in the history of this country. What is beginning to worry some of us is, is it too good to be true?—or perhaps I should say, is it too good to last? ... Our constant concern to-day is, can prices be steadied while at the same time we maintain full employment in an expanding economy? Can we control inflation? This is the problem of our time."

"[Macmillan] said that another round of wage increases such as there had been in the past two years could be disastrous... Such increases would not bring any benefit to anyone. They would only benefit men in a particular industry if they were the only ones to get them. But they would not be. If one industry started, others would follow. No one would gain anything, except more and more paper money, which would buy less and less."

"We must export to get necessities. We could not produce more than perhaps half our food. We had no raw materials, except coal and iron. Now we were importing both. We were even bringing coals to Newcastle, at least figuratively. All these imports must be paid for by exports... At first our main competitors—Germany and Japan—were out of the race. Now they were coming along very fast. We must not relax; on the contrary, we must make even greater efforts."

"Forever poised between a cliché and an indiscretion."

"What is the flaw in our present prosperity? What has gone wrong is that our competitors are taking some of our share in the export markets. The Germans and the Americans and the Japanese and other people, who were not competing actively with us until recently, are doing better than we are. The world's trade is growing all the time, but our share of it is creeping downwards all the time. Why are we not doing as well as our competitors? One reason is that we are spending so much money here that too many goods are bought at home which ought to be sold abroad. Besides, our prices go up faster than other people's, and that makes our goods harder to sell. Too easy to sell at home, too hard to sell abroad—all the result of too much spending power."

"What is our weakness then? ... We insist on getting extra money without turning out as many extra goods. We try to protect our standard of living by getting more pound notes, even if in the very act of getting them we make certain that they will not buy so much... Wages, salaries, and dividends cannot continue to go up faster than production. We must beat inflation or the inflation will beat us... When next you think about a wage or salary claim or a case for higher profits or dividends, just stop and ask yourself whether the firm's production is going up enough to make sure that prices will not have to rise, too."

"We must rely on the power of the nuclear deterrent or we must throw up the sponge. (1957)"

"Since the war we had produced a quarter more goods and services—and paid ourselves 80 per cent more money for doing it. That is why there is too much demand—too much spending power—and you will not stop that by fixing prices. What we have got to do is to stop pumping money in, or only pump it in at the same rate as the extra production we succeed in turning out."

"America is “the new Roman empire and we Britons, like the Greeks of old, must teach them how to make it go.”"

"By the achievement of this period of our rule in India, the British stand justified. Much will be left in the material sense—railways, dams, irrigation schemes, health services and the like—but perhaps the greatest contribution which the British genius has made has been the sense of equal justice, incorruptible and unchangeable, carried out equally for Hindu and for Muslim, for the poor as for the rich, the humble as for the exalted. This has set a standard of equity unrivalled in the history of the world."

"It is not enough to deplore and condemn the political excesses and the economic inadequacies of the totalitarian states. We must prove that democracy can do better."

"The masses now took prosperity for granted... The country simply did not realize that we were living beyond our income, and would have to pay for it sooner or later."

"The events of 1931 had struck a formidable blow to the hopes of a return to the pre-1914 "normalcy". Of course we had all known that there must be great changes resulting from the war: changes in economic and financial methods; still more, changes in concepts of social justice. But up to 1931 there was no reason to suppose that these would not, or could not, follow the same evolutionary pattern which had resulted from the increased creation and distribution of wealth throughout the nineteenth century. We had only to remove the hindrances to trade artificially created by the war and its aftermath. The rest would follow. Now, after 1931, many of us felt that the disease was more deep-rooted. It had become evident that the structure of capitalist society in its old form had broken down, not only in Britain but all over Europe and even in the United States. The whole system, therefore, had to be reassessed. Perhaps it could not survive at all; it certainly could not survive without radical change... [I]n the thirties, something like a revolutionary situation had developed, not only at home but overseas."

"In the course of some ninety years, the wheel has certainly turned full circle. The Protectionist case, which seemed to most of our fathers and grandfathers so outrageous, even so wicked, has been re-stated and carried to victory. Free Trade, which was almost like a sacred dogma, is in its turn rejected and despised... [M]any acute and energetic minds in the ’forties “looked to the end.” They foresaw what seemed beyond the vision of their rivals—that after the period of expansion would come the period of over-production... Disraeli] perceived only too clearly the danger of sacrificing everything to speed. Had he lived now, he would not have been surprised. The development of the world on competitive rather than on complementary lines; the growth of economic nationalism; the problems involved in the increasing productivity of labour, both industrial and agricultural; the absence of any new and rapidly developing area offering sufficient attractive opportunities for investment; finally, the heavy ensuing burden of unemployment, in every part of the world—all these phenomena, so constantly in our minds as part of the conditions of crisis, would have seemed to the men of Manchester nothing but a hideous nightmare. Disraeli would have understood them. I think he would have expected them."

"Although I am still in favour of a National Government in these difficult times, and shall probably be found in the great majority of cases in the Government Lobby, there are some issues that have arisen, or are likely to arise, upon which I am unable to give the Government the support which it has, perhaps, the right to expect from those receiving the Government Whip. It occurs to me, therefore, that it would perhaps be more satisfactory if I was no longer regarded as being among the supporters of the present Administration."