Quotessence
Home / Authors / Tom Hodgkinson
Tom Hodgkinson

Tom Hodgkinson Quotes

Writer

Filter quotes by topic

AllPeopleWorldGivingHoursIfsIdeasIdlersNeedsWantStaring

Famous Tom Hodgkinson Quotes

“By taking out a loan, I am committing myself to years of interest repayments, and therefore to years of wage slavery. And the UK has been borrowing like crazy since 1694, when the Bank of England was invented. This means that we are locked into high taxation to pay for 300 years of wars and other costly and generally disastrous state enterprises.”

YearsMeanHas BeensWarStatesInterestPayCrazyEnglandSlaveryEnterpriseLockedTaxationLoanBorrowingRepayment
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“Indolence of course is an absolutely crucial part of the creative process: you do not find poets sitting in rows in cavernous word factories, staring at screens. They are rather to be found lolling on the sofa or strolling through the groves, nursing their melancholic temperaments and losing themselves in extended reveries.”

CoursesFoundProcessCreativePoetLosingSittingScreensStaringCrucialFactoriesCreative ProcessTemperamentNursingStrollingIndolenceSofasGroveReverie
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“It takes a while to master the art of hammock-lounging. At first I could only manage five minutes or so before I thought I ought to get out and go and help a child learn how to swim or something. But after observing the Mexicans' capability for staring into space for hours on end, I decided to put in some proper practice.”

FirstsChildrenArtEndsHelpingHoursSpacePracticeFiveMinutesMastersOughtDecidedManageStaringSwimCapabilityFive MinutesObservingHammocksLoungingStaring Into Space
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“We think we have to work because the advertising industry has elevated wants into needs. The newspapers and the television batter us incessantly with the latest "must-haves", whether that's shoes, videogames or patio heaters. As a result, mums think they "have" to work at Tesco in order to buy expensive trainers.”

ThinkingWantNeedsOrderResultsTelevisionIndustryShoesNewspapersAdvertisingExpensiveMumTrainersIncessantlyVideogameAdvertising IndustryTesco
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“If Adam and Eve were not hunter-gatherers, then they were certainly gatherers. But, then, consumer desire, or self-embitterment, or the 'itch,' as Schopenhauer called it, appeared in the shape of the serpent. This capitalistic monster awakens in Adam and Eve the possibility that things could be better. Instantly, they are cast out of the garden and condemned to a life of toil, drudgery, and pain. Wants supplanted needs, and things have been going downhill ever since.”

IfsWantNeedsHas BeensSelfPainDesirePossibilityShapesGardenCastsMonstersConsumersAdamToilHuntersSerpentAdam And EveDrudgeryHunter Gatherers
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“Education itself is a putting off, a postponement; we are told to work hard to get good results. Why? So we can get a good job. What is a good job? One that pays well. Oh. And that's it? All this suffering, merely so that we can earn a lot of money, which, even if we manage it, will not solve our problems anyway? It's a tragically limited idea of what life is all about.”

IfsWellsIdeasHardProblemJobsLife IsSufferingResultsPayLearningHard WorkSolveManageLots Of MoneyGood JobSchooledUnschoolingPostponementProblems In School
Author:Tom Hodgkinson
Create image

“Life has been reduced to a series of long periods of boredom in the office punctuated by high-octane "experiences" which you can rack up on your list of things to do before you die. That's not really living: that is slavery with the occasional circus thrown in.”

LongHas BeensDiesPeriodsOfficeSlaverySeriesListsBoredThings To DoBoredomThrownCircusOccasionalRacksReally Living
Book:Brave Old World: A Month-by-Month Guide to Husbandry, or the Fine Art of Looking After Yourself
Create image

“Guilt is also a way for us to express to others that we are a person of good conscience. 'I feel really guilty about getting drunk last night,' we say, when in actual fact we feel no guilt whatsoever or, at least, we could choose to feel no guilt. When people say to me, 'I drank too much last night,' I always reply, 'I drank exactly the right amount.”

PeopleWayFeelsPersonsFactsLastsNightToo MuchAmountConscienceGuiltGuiltyDrunkLast NightDrankGetting Drunk
Book:How to be Free
Create image