Quotessence
Home / Books / Hard to Be a God

Hard to Be a God

Book by Arkady Strugatsky · 6 quotes · Anti Art, Anti Science, Bookworms

Filter quotes by topic

AllAnti ArtAnti ScienceBookwormsCensorshipDeterminismFreedomGodHistorical DeterminismHumanismHumanityIntellectual FreedomKnowledgeLidstvoLudditesOppressionPhilosophySinSlaverySocial SystemSociety

Hard to Be a God Quotes

“И всегда будут короли, более или менее жестокие, бароны, более или менее дикие, и всегда будет невежественный народ, питающий восхищение к своим угнетателям и ненависть к своему освободителю. И все потому, что раб гораздо лучше понимает своего господина, пусть даже самого жестокого, чем своего освободителя, ибо каждый раб отлично представляет себя на месте господина, но мало кто представляет себя на месте бескорыстного освободителя.”

PhilosophyFreedomSlaverySocial System
Book:Hard to Be a God
Create image

“And no matter how much the gray people in power despise knowledge, they can’t do anything about historical objectivity; they can slow it down, but they can’t stop it. Despising and fearing knowledge, they will nonetheless inevitably decide to promote it in order to survive. Sooner or later they will be forced to allow universities and scientific societies, to create research centers, observatories, and laboratories, and thus to create a cadre of people of thought and knowledge: people who are completely beyond their control, people with a completely different psychology and with completely different needs. And these people cannot exist and certainly cannot function in the former atmosphere of low self-interest, banal preoccupations, dull self-satisfaction, and purely carnal needs. They need a new atmosphere— an atmosphere of comprehensive and inclusive learning, permeated with creative tension; they need writers, artists, composers— and the gray people in power are forced to make this concession too. The obstinate ones will be swept aside by their more cunning opponents in the struggle for power, but those who make this concession are, inevitably and paradoxically, digging their own graves against their will. For fatal to the ignorant egoists and fanatics is the growth of a full range of culture in the people— from research in the natural sciences to the ability to marvel at great music. And then comes the associated process of the broad intellectualization of society: an era in which grayness fights its last battles with a brutality that takes humanity back to the middle ages, loses these battles, and forever disappears as an actual force.”

KnowledgeSocietyCensorshipDeterminismIntellectual FreedomHistorical Determinism
Book:Hard to Be a God
Create image

“No country can develop without science - it will be destroyed by its neighbors. Without arts and general culture, the country loses its capacity for self-criticism, begins to encourage faulty tendencies, starts to constantly spawn hypocrites and scum, develops consumerism and conceit in its citizens, and eventually again becomes a victim of its more sensible neighbors. Persecute bookworms all you like, prohibit science, and destroy art, but sooner or later you'll be forced to think better of it, and with much gnashing of teeth open the way for everything that is so hated by the power-hungry dullards and blockheads.”

OppressionBookwormsLudditesAnti ScienceAnti Art
Book:Hard to Be a God
Create image

“Boj proti zlu! Ale co je to zlo? Každý má možnost ho chápat po svém. Pro nás, vědce, je zlo v neznalosti, ale církev učí, že neznalost je štěstí a všechno zlo pochází naopak z vědění. Pro rolníka jsou zlem daně a sucha, kdežto pro obchodníka obilím jsou sucha požehnáním. Pro otroka je zlem opilý pán, pro řemeslníka ziskuchtivý lichvář. Tak co je vlastně zlo, proti kterému se má bojovat? Zlo se nedá vyhubit. Žádný člověk není schopen snížit množství zla ve světě. Může jen poněkud zlepšit svůj vlastní osud, ale vždycky na úkor zhoršení osudu jiných. A vždycky budou králové, více či méně krutí, baroni, více či méně divocí, a vždycky bude omezený lid, nadšeně vzhlížející ke svým utlačovatelům a nenávidějící svého osvoboditele. A to všechno proto, že otrok mnohem lépe rozumí svému pánovi, byť sebekrutějšímu, než svému osvoboditeli, neboť každý otrok si výborně dokáže představit sám sebe na místě pána, ale málokdo si představuje sám sebe na místě nezištného osvoboditele. Takoví jsou lidé. Takový je náš svět.”

ZloLidstvo
Book:Hard to Be a God
Create image