Pedantry with Arnoud Visser

Terry Eagleton's The Rise of English examines how the academic study of English literature developed as a discipline and the ideological forces shaping its institutionalization. Eagleton explores the social class dynamics, professional interests, and cultural politics that influenced the rise of English departments, arguing that literary study can be complicit in broader social structures. He also reflects critically on claims that humanistic education inherently produces moral improvement, using historical examples to complicate that narrative. Eagleton's lively and polemical style situates literary scholarship within debates about power, taste, and ethics, making the book a notable intervention in cultural critique.

On Pedantry: A Cultural History of the Know-it-All offers an altogether different perspective, revealing how the excessive use of learning has been a vice in Western culture since the days of Socrates. Taking readers from the academies of ancient Greece to today’s culture wars, Arnoud Visser explains why pretentious and punctilious learning has always annoyed us, painting vibrant portraits of some of the most intensely irritating intellectuals ever known, from devious sophists and bossy savantes to hypercritical theologians, dry-as-dust antiquarians, and know-it-all professors. He shows how criticisms of pedantry have typically been more about conduct than ideas, and he demonstrates how pedantry served as a weapon in the perennial struggle over ideas, social status, political authority, and belief. Shifting attention away from the self-proclaimed virtues of the learned to their less-than-flattering vice, Visser makes a bold and provocative contribution to the history of Western thought. Drawing on a wealth of sources ranging from satire and comedy to essays, sermons, and film, On Pedantry sheds critical light on why anti-intellectual views have gained renewed prominence today and serves as essential reading in an age of rising populism across the globe.

On Pedantry: A Cultural History of the Know-it-All offers an altogether different perspective, revealing how the excessive use of learning has been a vice in Western culture since the days of Socrates. Taking readers from the academies of ancient Greece to today’s culture wars, Arnoud Visser explains why pretentious and punctilious learning has always annoyed us, painting vibrant portraits of some of the most intensely irritating intellectuals ever known, from devious sophists and bossy savantes to hypercritical theologians, dry-as-dust antiquarians, and know-it-all professors. He shows how criticisms of pedantry have typically been more about conduct than ideas, and he demonstrates how pedantry served as a weapon in the perennial struggle over ideas, social status, political authority, and belief. Shifting attention away from the self-proclaimed virtues of the learned to their less-than-flattering vice, Visser makes a bold and provocative contribution to the history of Western thought. Drawing on a wealth of sources ranging from satire and comedy to essays, sermons, and film, On Pedantry sheds critical light on why anti-intellectual views have gained renewed prominence today and serves as essential reading in an age of rising populism across the globe.

'The Essays' by Michel de Montaigne is a collection of 107 essays covering a vast range of topics from personal anecdotes to philosophical musings. Written in the 16th century, the essays are celebrated for their introspective and conversational style. Montaigne explores themes of self-discovery, morality, education, and human nature with honesty and skepticism. The essays reflect Montaigne's belief in the importance of self-examination and his famous motto, 'What do I know? '. His work remains influential for its contribution to the essay form and its timeless exploration of the human condition.