Quote

If western culture is shown to be rich it is because, even before the Enlightenment, it has tried to dissolve harmful simplifications through inquiry and the critical mind.

Umberto Eco

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Umberto Eco
Age: 84 †
Born: 1932
Born: January 5
Died: 2016
Died: February 19
Essayist
Historian
Literary Critic
Literary Scholar
Medievalist
Novelist
Pedagogue
Philosopher
Screenwriter
Semiotician
Translator
Lissändria
Umberto Ecco
Umberto Eccounstino
Humberto Eco
Dedalus
Umberto Eko
Oumperto Eko
Eco Umberto
U. Eco
Rich
Dissolve
Culture
Harmful
Even
Inquiry
Shown
Mind
Enlightenment
Critical
Western
Tried
Simplification

More quotes by Umberto Eco

Image
Daytime sleep is like the sin of the flesh the more you have the more you want, and yet you feel unhappy, sated and unsated at the same time.
Umberto Eco
Image
When one starts writing a book, especially a novel, even the humblest person in the world hopes to become Homer.
Umberto Eco
Image
Books always speak of other books.
Umberto Eco
Image
Not that the incredulous person doesn't believe in anything. It's just that he doesn't believe in everything.
Umberto Eco
Image
There are no stories without meaning. And I am one of those men who can find it even when others fail to see it. Afterwards the story becomes the book of the living, like a blaring trumpet that raises from the tomb those who have been dust for centuries.
Umberto Eco
Image
I've always said that I learned the English I know through two sources -- Marvel Comics and Finnegans Wake.
Umberto Eco
Image
There are four types: the cretin, the imbecile, the stupid and the mad. Normality is a balanced mixture of all four.
Umberto Eco
Image
A secret is powerful when it is empty.
Umberto Eco
Image
I love the smell of book ink in the morning.
Umberto Eco
Image
I developed a passion for the Middle Ages the same way some people develop a passion for coconuts.
Umberto Eco
Image
They [the Templars] had read Avicenna, and they were not ignorant, like the Europeans. How could you live alongside a tolerant, mystical, libertine culture for two centuries without succumbing to its allure, particularly when you compared it to Western culture, which was crude, vulgar, barbaric, and Germanic?
Umberto Eco
Image
Well, Diotallevi and I are planning a reform in higher education. A School of Comparative Irrelevance, where useless or impossibe courses are given. The school's aim is to turn out scholars capable of endlessly increasing the number of unnecessary subjects.
Umberto Eco
Image
A secret is powerful when it is empty. People often mention the Masonic secret. What on earth is the Masonic secret? No one can tell. As long as it remains empty it can be filled up with every possible notion, and it has power.
Umberto Eco
Image
Every great thinker is someone else's moron.
Umberto Eco
Image
The Fundamental Principle that governs - or ought to govern -human affairs if we wish to avoid misunderstandings, conflicts, or pointless utopias, is negotiation.
Umberto Eco
Image
The only truth lies in learning to free ourselves from insane passion for the truth.
Umberto Eco
Image
It is obvious that the newspaper produces the opinion of the readers.
Umberto Eco
Image
All the religious wars that have caused blood to be shed for centuries arise from passionate feelings and facile counter-positions, such as Us and Them, good and bad, white and black.
Umberto Eco
Image
Beauty has never been absolute and immutable but has taken on different aspects depending on the historical period and the country
Umberto Eco
Image
They say that a cat, if it falls from a window and hits its nose, can lose its sense of smell and then, because cats live by their ability to smell, it can no longer recognize things. I'm a cat that hit its nose.
Umberto Eco