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The barbarians are laughing at us Culture warriors are losing the battle for civilisation

(GraphicaArtis/Getty Images)


April 30, 2024   6 mins

There are many contenders to be the world’s predominant civilisation in the remainder of the 21st century. In Moscow in March, a group of top clergy and pious entrepreneurs from the Kremlin’s inner circle lauded their country’s role as creators of the so-called Russian World. This was defined as a “spiritual and cultural-civilisational phenomenon” stretching far beyond the state’s legal borders, embracing all those who recognised the Russians’ self-imposed mission, which was to restrain evil across the globe.

In Beijing, President Xi Jinping has ramped up his appeals for the creation of a “new form of human civilisation” based on a fusion of communist ideology with his own country’s ancient traditions. Meanwhile, Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei has for at least five years been urging compatriots to develop a “new Islamic-Iranian civilisation” that would integrate at a higher level the Muslim revelation and the older traditions of Persia.

What unites all these projects is a message that is at once defensive and breezily assertive. All aspire to be counterweights to the horrible hegemony of a cynical, mercantilist West, whose masters allegedly seek to iron out all forms of distinctiveness, everything that gives meaning to human life. And all exude confidence that tomorrow belongs to them.

So what, if anything, does Western civilisation have to say in its own defence? Until recently, discussions about such broad ideological questions have been rather introverted. If people argued over the usefulness, or the virtue, of “the West” as a cultural signifier, it was often in the context of narrow debates over the curriculum — or how the past should be presented through museums and monuments. Douglas Murray’s bestselling The War on the West refers more to domestic culture wars than to any global ideological contest — though he does elaborate the argument that the transgressions of the West, including colonialism and racism, have never been Western monopolies.

Given the hitherto confined nature of this debate, perhaps we should welcome an astonishing new contribution — How the World made the West — by Josephine Quinn, who has just been appointed to an ancient history chair at Cambridge. Amid an ocean of fascinating detail about little-known trading links and technological breakthroughs, she makes the impertinent argument that there is really no such thing as a civilisation, or even a distinct culture, and so there cannot be such a thing as a Western one. In her view of history, all the categories by which people have tried to organise the past melt away; there are no transmissions between cultures, but rather endless micro-transactions between individual traders, raiders and people struggling randomly to survive.

Paradoxically, her argument would be read in Beijing, Tehran or Moscow as an expression of a characteristically Western, capitalist pathology. It would be denounced as a typically arrogant effort to steamroller all difference, all the religions, traditions, proud collective memories that give sense to human communities, and to reduce humanity to an amorphous mass of pliant consumers. (To those of us who lived in Russia in the Nineties, it now feels as though the wackiest forms of anti-Western nativism and Russian Messianism — incubated, ironically, by the rollicking free speech of the Yeltsin years — have become the Muscovite mainstream.)

The author’s keenest interest is in material culture and trade, as evidenced by archaeology. She is interested in the written word not as an expression of the human spirit but as evidence for what crops were grown, what metals were smelted and what goods were traded. In the final third of the book, the emphasis switches to the transmission of ideas and inventions — stressing the contribution of brainy Muslim and Asian thinkers and mathematicians to Western Europe’s development. All good stuff.

She reserves, however, a disproportionate opprobrium for romantic British philhellenism, for example the claim of John Stuart Mill that the battle of Marathon, in which democratic Athens triumphed over the Persians, mattered more to the story of England than did the clash at Hastings. In truth, she provocatively argues, that Greek battle could be regarded as a minor skirmish in a punitive expedition by the Persians in which many Greeks took the Persian side. And modern readers, she suggests, should find as much to admire in Persian society as among the slave-owning, sexist Athenians.

The book is presented, in part, as a critique of the “reception” of Hellenism by the post-enlightenment world. It argues that the facts of east Mediterranean history were cynically distorted by imperial Britain. Part of the distortion, she insists, lay in isolating Greece and its golden age from all the cultures with which the Greeks interacted, like the Egyptians and the Phoenicians. Or indeed from the Persians, with whom the Greek relationship — as she notes — was ambivalent not unremittingly hostile.

She is right to say that Western ideologues of the imperial and Cold-War eras reread Greek history and literature in ways that suited them. So did every other consumer of that brilliant canon. Yet over and above her provocative generalisations, there is a real question. Once you remove the liberal-imperialist lens through which Victorian Britain, and indeed Cold-War America, viewed ancient Athens, what remains of the idea of a Greek-influenced West?

Perhaps the first point to make is that golden-age Hellenism is not a monolithic phenomenon. It is a vast range of superbly expressed feelings and opinions. The elitist idealism of Plato differs from the empirical rationalism of Aristotle. The formal Athenian patriotism of Aeschylus (which does not exclude a human empathy for the Persian dead) is different from the mischievous scepticism of fellow dramatist Euripides. The variety of worldviews is enormous.

“Golden-age Hellenism is not a monolithic phenomenon.”

Professor Quinn writes with compelling passion about the way in which coastal communities — for example on Crete — “picked and chose” from the products and technology, and the religious and cultural practices, offered by trading partners across the sea. It is equally the case that modern Westerners — like everybody else — have picked and chosen from the cultural and metaphysical resources offered by the classical world, and Greece in particular. But the availability of that treasure-chest mattered; it was not trivial.

Nor, it should be said, did the Anglo-Saxon reception of Greek history begin or end with Mill. It was in 1628 that Thomas Hobbes translated Thucydides, delivering a landmark in English prose and political thought. In the 20th century, the Irish-born leftist E.R. Dodds offered a counterblast to conservative philhellenism in The Greeks and the Irrational. Elsewhere in Western Europe, leading interpreters of ancient Athens have included French Marxists who adored Plato.

Distilling all this, there is surely one feature of ancient Athens whose influence on the modern West remains palpable and worth defending against its many enemies, including those who counter-propose one or other form of authoritarianism. That feature is the ability of a highly sophisticated society to question and laugh at itself; to subject powerful individuals to public scrutiny, accountability and ridicule; to engage in robust public debate in the hope that good information will drive out bad. The British Victorians only partly understood this; they read the comedies of Aristophanes with the naughtier bits excised.

The collective West is of course guilty of many historic sins, but it differs from totalitarian societies and resembles democratic Athens in the way it still (just about) retains the capacity for self-scrutiny, self-correction and no-holds-barred discussion. It is unlikely that a history professor in Russia, China or Iran would remain in place long after publishing a book arguing that their country’s civilisation was actually an illusion. Perhaps there is something magnificent about the fact that a book so wildly iconoclastic as Quinn’s can be published, and taken seriously: a perverse proof that the Periclean West is alive, so much so that people can deny its existence with cheerful impunity.

Still, the book’s relatively uncritical reception, hailing its boldest claims as well as its incontestable virtues, risks persuading some of the world’s authoritarians that the defence of liberal democracy is now a spent force. The Guardian’s reviewer, for example, hails the book as a “brilliant and learned challenge to modern western chauvinism”. Brilliant and learned some of its insights assuredly are, but is “western chauvinism” still such a terrible, untamed beast that it needs to be attacked in long and learned polemics? That need was more evident in 1969, when Kenneth Clark launched his purring televised perorations on art history from the banks of the Seine. Or even in 1990, when the Cold War’s outcome triggered an unhealthy hubris, as the Greeks would have said. Now, maybe not so much.

So what then will be the reaction to the book and its reception from the geopolitical enemies of Western civilisation, who think it exists and want to destroy it — not just intellectually but physically?

To them, it may now seem as though today’s Western commentariat resembles the late Roman community so vividly described by the poet Cavafy: people jaded with cultural and political sophistication who are waiting, rather eagerly, for barbarians who offer “some kind of a solution” to life’s tedium.


Bruce Clark is a former International Security Editor of The Economist, and the author of Twice A Stranger: How Mass Expulsion Forged Modern Greece and Turkey.


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Brian Kneebone
Brian Kneebone
5 months ago

The West borrowed, took, and invented. The result, for better or worse, is the modern World. History is what it was, not as we would have liked it to be. Perhaps the future will be determined elsewhere. It may be better or worse than we experience now. Work for future historians, no doubt.

Mike Downing
Mike Downing
5 months ago
Reply to  Brian Kneebone

Not just the West; the Koran is a hodgepodge of Persian sayings, bits of Platonic philosophy and ideas lifted straight from the Bible. Nothing in civilisation is original but only the West has to apologise for the fact and only in the West can ‘scholars’ get paid to rubbish the system that, whatever its shortcomings (like any system), has given them the opportunity to do it.

Dylan Blackhurst
Dylan Blackhurst
5 months ago

I find it funny that so many criticise and rubbish the west’s contribution to the world.
And then in the very next moment pull on their Burberry raincoat, step into their Mercedes Benz, get on a Boeing and fly half way around the world and still fail to see what the west (and god forbid, possibly the worst of all, white males) have given them.

Andrew Dalton
Andrew Dalton
5 months ago

And doing all of the above well into their sixties, seventies and beyond.

Warren Trees
Warren Trees
5 months ago
Reply to  Andrew Dalton

Yes, versus living in a cardboard hut with no chance, whatsoever, of moving ahead in life. But they tell us those people are happier than us, so it’s all good.

David L
David L
5 months ago
Reply to  Warren Trees

Cardboard, another western invention.

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
5 months ago

If you are right why are all the illegal immigrants heading for China, Russia, Pakistan and Iran

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
5 months ago

Judging by the down votes, there are some sarcasm meters within the commentariat in need of recalibration.

King David
King David
5 months ago

LOL…the problem with the White Male is he is a midget standing on the shoulders of Black Giants from Kemet and the BlackaMoors and he doesn’t even know it. He also has a rather peculiar habit of performing felatio on himself. Tell the Black Mathematicians Engineers at NASA who did the mathematical calculations that sent you White Males to the moon. White Male John Glenn would not enter the Rocket unless this group of Black Mathematicians signed off on the calculations. Read the Book “Hidden Figures”. Go to US Government Black Patent Office yes Black Patent office because they had Separate Patent Office. You will see who Amerikkkas most prolific inventors were and are. From George Washington Carver and Elijah Real McCoy the Black Male was inventing things while in chains. Now that’s a neat trick the White Male is not familiar with. The White Male can not claim TRUE superiority when he has the competition locked in a dungeon in his basement can he? As for planes a Black man spent his life savings ( his name escapes me) submitted first airplane or flying machine. He loaded the prototype on a train in cargo in I believe South Carolina?? to attend 1906? World Fair in Chicago I believe …when he arrived and went to pick up his prototype disappeared. The White SUPREMACIST train attendants three it off the train. A few years later the Wright Brothers get credit for first flight. This sabotage is the classic Evil works of the White Male. You seem to have a rather romantic self serving delusional view of the White Male. By the way what is Western Culture? It’s the Black man who bestrides the Western World like a Black colossus creating Western music. dance and culture and arts. Who are the creators and followers Black Males or White Males? Who did Mick Jagger the Beatles worship and emulate musically and culturally when they were growing up and to this very day? As for the Black Air plane inventor I can dig up the info for you Barbarian hordes of White Males if you think I am fabricating the Black Aviator story. Plus Western Civilization let us not forget was created by White Greek Homosexual Males who sexually molested and exploited little boys. I dont think that is a civilization or culture a Black man would brag about homie.

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
5 months ago
Reply to  King David

The wright brothers first flew in 1903

Bret Larson
Bret Larson
5 months ago
Reply to  King David

Black white, man women ?, I don’t see any difference. People tend to advance and better their conditions when they have opportunity and can work for themselves. We all need to try to make sure these conditions persist.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
5 months ago
Reply to  King David

And slavery, don’t forget that. None whites were at it for hundreds of years before Whitey got in on the act.
Funny how it’s never mentioned.

King David
King David
5 months ago

Lol…. Hey don’t forget according to Putin you also gave us A wonderful Fake White Jesus . Also don’t forget Genital Herpes and Sodomy.

King David
King David
5 months ago

Don’t forget Druids Cannibalism and human sacrifice.

King David
King David
5 months ago

GOLLY gee I feel like a Black Skunk at an All- White Party?

King David
King David
5 months ago

LOL Unheard is like a white echo chamber. White folks paying to get together to tell each other how wonderful they are. Gee why didn’t Black folks think of that ? Lol

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
5 months ago
Reply to  King David

I thought that’s all they did

Michael Cavanaugh
Michael Cavanaugh
5 months ago

Romanes ite domum

Tony Taylor
Tony Taylor
5 months ago

Romani.
Now, type it a hundred times.

Hugo White
Hugo White
5 months ago

When you say the west you really mean the English speaking world, with Germany thrown in

Lancashire Lad
Lancashire Lad
5 months ago

Before reading this article, i commented on the Lionel Shriver article that the institutions and arts organisations of the West are boring its citizens to death.

This writer cites Josephine Quinn’s latest output as a kind of demonstration, unavailable to historians in authoritarian regimes, of our ability to critique our own cultural heritage.

The battle for the next stage in human history is underway. Quinn’s emphasis on the artefacts of trade and economic exchange at the micro level as the key determinents of the historical narrative might be worth considering. If civilisations rise and fall according to their trading prowess, the battle is enjoined between those regimes which allow its citizens to participate with relative freedom in economic activity, and those regimes which don’t. Perhaps inadvertently, Quinn supplies an endorsement for the West, whose cultural heritage she might consider she’s undermining.

Renewal is required, and in order for new cultural crops to grow, the soil must be tilled. Quinn can be regarded as a Tiller Girl.

Martin Bollis
Martin Bollis
5 months ago
Reply to  Lancashire Lad

Tried to kick high but succeeded only in displaying her underwear. Excellent.

Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
5 months ago
Reply to  Martin Bollis

Naughty: the fun inspectors will have you in detention ‘ere long.

Chris Whybrow
Chris Whybrow
5 months ago

The thing is, everyone is a spent force. We’re a spent force, Russia is a spent force, China is a spent force. So in the long run, I don’t really see them as an existential threat.

michael harris
michael harris
5 months ago
Reply to  Chris Whybrow

And Islam? Spent?

Mike Downing
Mike Downing
5 months ago
Reply to  michael harris

Not yet, but apparently religious observance is going down even in Muslim countries and as economic conditions improve, they’ll surely experience the same effects of women’s emancipation and falling birthrates.

Even in Iran where the penalties for non-compliance are very high, young women in cities have their eyes set firmly on Western-type lives.

Mind you, after they get the life they want and experience Western-type family breakdown and anomie, there may be a religious revival (I won’t be around to see it).

Paul T
Paul T
5 months ago

So what she is saying, effectively, if that the shallow and insipid West bought its culture through trade with other civilisations. Of course she would.

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
5 months ago
Reply to  Paul T

If proof was needed that the West is shallow or insipid it would be the appointment of Josephine Quinn to an ancient history chair at Cambridge

D Glover
D Glover
5 months ago

 How the World made the West  will also be presented as a talk by Josephine Quinn, at the Chalke Valley History Festival this coming June.
It’s noticeable that this is their first year without Daily Mail sponsorship, and they’ve taken a definite turn away from patriotic militarism and towards post-colonial revisionism.

Chris Bradshaw
Chris Bradshaw
5 months ago

 In her view of history, all the categories by which people have tried to organise the past melt away; there are no transmissions between cultures, but rather endless micro-transactions between individual traders, raiders and people struggling randomly to survive.

“Who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first.”

Martin Bollis
Martin Bollis
5 months ago
Reply to  Chris Bradshaw

Excellent

Arthur King
Arthur King
5 months ago
Reply to  Chris Bradshaw

We’ve reached peak hyper-individualism which sees the idea of common culture as fascist.

Victor James
Victor James
5 months ago

The leftist who wrote this book can relax. I’m one of the Western chauvinists she’s attacking.
Britain, for example, was home to the Agricultural, Scientific, and Industrial revolutions, as well as the political revolutions that went on to lift vast swathes of humanity out of material poverty for the first time. It also provided key figures in the Enlightenment, another revolution that changed the world.
These are astonishing events. Magnificent stuff. The West, or the culture of the European people, can be proud.
But that was in the past.
Unfortunately, the West, and especially Britain, is now a narrow, little, sniveling husk of a thing, the author is no doubt chest-thumping proud. Much of the world, especially Asia, has now caught up technologically. In Asia, their streets are safer, their economies more dynamic. Their elites not obsessed with a mustached man from the ’30s. Their borders are actually intact because of this.
So, congrats to the author for kicking a thing when it’s down. Congratulations, again. The West is a declined, feeble husk of a thing, I concur.

Bret Larson
Bret Larson
5 months ago
Reply to  Victor James

Hopefully spring comes soon.

Archibald Tennyson
Archibald Tennyson
5 months ago

Disclaimer: I haven’t read the book by Josephine Quinn, just this cursory review. Still, the article only seems to mention Greco-Roman civilisation as the foundation of our own. It seems to leave out the C-word (no, not that one). I can’t see any mention of Christianity. Strange.
Is our cultural inheritance not heavily inspired by a fusion of the Hellenic and Hebraic? Any analysis of the West surely needs to address that. There’s no point discussing Athens without mentioning Antioch or Jerusalem.
Can anyone provide some clarity on Quinn’s views about our Christian inheritance?

Lancashire Lad
Lancashire Lad
5 months ago

Whilst you and I often clash about the merits of religion in the 21st century, you’re absolutely correct in pointing out an integral but missing element to the development of the West in either the above analysis or Quinn’s book.
In particular, the post-medieval transition away from Roman Catholicism towards what became known as the ‘Protestant work ethic’ played a huge role in the onset and flowering of modern industrial societies.

Arthur G
Arthur G
5 months ago
Reply to  Lancashire Lad

The “Protestant work ethic” is a 120 year old discredited theory.

T Bone
T Bone
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur G

Only 120 years old? Discredited by whom?

Richard Pearse
Richard Pearse
5 months ago
Reply to  T Bone

Léo Strauss (in his deep analysis of Weber in “Natural Law and History”) noted that those in the North who tended to Protestantism (especially Calvinist-tinged English and Scottish) were more open to the “new” free market forms of business and trade, not because of a later interpretation of Calvin, but because they had rejected Aristotle and replaced with Francis Bacon and his spawn, Adam Smith.
Whereas Lutherans and the RC Church held on to Aristotles ethics and physics.

Michael Cavanaugh
Michael Cavanaugh
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur G

Only 119, in fact. Certain interpretations of Weber’s thesis are disputed. Can we really dispute that inner-worldly asceticism, pioneered by the Protestant sects, provided the intellectual and motivational framework for widespread modern secular rationality?

Bret Larson
Bret Larson
5 months ago
Reply to  Arthur G

As an RC I sure hope you’re wrong. I kinda like Protestants working their butts off.

Gordon Arta
Gordon Arta
5 months ago
Reply to  Lancashire Lad

The Reformation didn’t result in a ‘Protestant work ethic’, though there were elements of that. Its principal achievement was that it challenged the imposed certainties of religious clerics, breaking their monopoly on what could be believed, thought and said. It paved the way for the Enlightenment, where doubt, the recognition that there is always more to learn, was not only tolerated, but celebrated. It’s doubt which drives human progress, and the certainties of critical theories and the ‘woke’ which are driving it backwards.

William Reynolds
William Reynolds
5 months ago

Academics prefer to steer clear of Christianity, unless it’s their field and unless they are R Dawkins. Acemoglu and Robinson’s The Narrow Corridor cried out for a reference to the role of Christianity in Western political formation, but not a squeak was to be heard.

Matt Woodsmith
Matt Woodsmith
5 months ago

I think you all need to read ‘Dominion’ by Tom Holland, in which he argues exactly this – that while the west has indeed ‘borrowed’ features from other cultures, Christianity is absolutely what underpins the west, makes it distinctive and provides all the values that we assume are universal, but are not.

King David
King David
5 months ago

You forgot to mention your Black Kemet-Egypt inheritance? Lol

Madas A. Hatter
Madas A. Hatter
5 months ago

The rebuttal of Quin’s thesis already exists, along the lines you suggest, in Tom Holland’s masterful book Dominion. He demonstrates conclusively that neither Marxism, universal suffrage, the end of slavery (in its historic form), capitalism and virtually every manifestation of all our modern societies owes its very existence to Christianity. That is to say, the Judaeo-Hellenistic creed Paul crafted that in many ways differs from that envisioned in the Gospels.

John Riordan
John Riordan
5 months ago

From the sound of it, this book appears to emphasise that the nature of culture and the forces of change are driven primarily through the collective actions of individuals who are free, as opposed to those who may be less so, for whatever reason. This is not a new idea: Matt Ridley draws a straight line between Lucretius (yes I know he a Roman philosopher not a Greek one, but the principle is the same) and the principles of modern liberty that underpin markets, political freedom and the nature of innovation, for instance.

Either way though, this probably explains why the task of defining accurately what a distinct culture is, must be done in retrospect rather than being something that is obvious to – or controllable by – people living through the times and events that may later come to be seen as a coherent whole.

I am not sure though that it’s particularly revelatory that Western cultures identify with some aspects of ancient Greece but apparently do so hypocritically because they dismiss or ignore other aspects. This is true, but meaningless in the context of how ideas are subject to constant testing in the age reason we inhabit.

We can say that our democratic ideals were founded in ancient Greece without ever being obliged to argue that slavery is a good idea just because the Greeks also owned slaves at the time the democratic principles we inherited came into being. We kept democracy because it is good, and we abolished slavery because it is bad. Nothing to see here.

RM Parker
RM Parker
5 months ago
Reply to  John Riordan

Quite. In fact, we almost bankrupted the nation by policing the abolition of slavery on the high seas – not to mention the cost in human lives of so doing. Admittedly I’ve not read her book, but from this piece it looks likely that Josephine Quinn has conveniently elided that facet of our history from her otherwise no doubt magisterial composition.

Kirk Susong
Kirk Susong
5 months ago

“She is right to say that Western ideologues of the imperial and Cold-War eras reread Greek history and literature in ways that suited them.”
But she does not? Revisionist histories are fun and enjoyable and they make interesting reading. But they, too, will be revised one day.

Kelly Madden
Kelly Madden
5 months ago

It wasn’t primarily the classical world that gave the West a sense of “self-scrutiny, self-correction and no-holds-barred discussion.” It was a book, unmentioned here, in which the only true hero is a God who cares so much for our self-inflicted misery as to become one of us, in order to save us.

Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
5 months ago

The answer to all those who question whether Western Civilization exists, is of any value, is just hypocrisy, or totally ‘culturally appropriated’ is Gallileo’s: “E pur si muove.”

All of the criticisms may have some validity, but there remains a kernel of truth, an irreducible particle of distinctive thought, culture and behaviours, which we can call ‘Western’ and praise and honour as such.

R Wright
R Wright
5 months ago

More dull Edward Said level materialist slop not worth reading. If there is nothing worth defending in the west then Quinn won’t have to worry as the Goths are already here and will soon be knocking at her door.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
5 months ago

So what, if anything, does Western civilisation have to say in its own defence?
Does the author mean what, outside of the ritual self-hatred that is so prevalent? The West need not look outward for enemies; it has them within. To an extent, it has been cultivating them for the past few generations and the results are evident – people, especially in the US, act as if 1924 rather than 2024. And the concept of democracy is being buried under an avalanche of govt-sponsored censorship efforts, the privileging of certain immutable characteristics, and massive debts.
The internal attack is writ large in the machinations of the WEF and its self-anointed masters of the universe who would shape and control our every activity. The Western tradition has much to be proud of, far more than it has reason for shame. Yes, some black marks exists; show me the culture free of them. But weighed against the achievements, the trade-off is a net good.

Jim McDonnell
Jim McDonnell
5 months ago

It’s worth noting that Russia’s claim to special status stems from its concept of itself as “the third Rome,” heir to the Graeco-Roman Byzantine Empire. Go back far enough and Russia and “the West” are drawing on the same heritage.

Vijay Kant
Vijay Kant
5 months ago

A civilization must have humanism at its core to survive for thousands of years. Islam and communism, unfortunately, fall short in this regard.

King David
King David
5 months ago
Reply to  Vijay Kant

I am sure Hinduism does not fall short eh Vijay? It’s the other guys shit that falls short eh?

Vijay Kant
Vijay Kant
5 months ago
Reply to  King David

Do not judge others by your own standard…

Michael Cavanaugh
Michael Cavanaugh
5 months ago
Reply to  Vijay Kant

The glory that was Egypt?

Mark Melvin
Mark Melvin
5 months ago

I enjoyed this article immensely as it called to mind a different article I read a few days ago. It was to do with the recently failed merger of the two largest US book publishers, Penguin and someone else. The court case brought together in the public eye all the CEOs of all the major US publishers. Their views were pretty similar as were the statistics they shared.
Firstly, the business is cutthroat and not that profitable. Almost no new author makes money for the publishers. Honorable exception with JKR of course. Up to half of their revenue is from sales of the back catalogue, apparently 8% of revenues comes from sale of the Bible. That says something.
Secondly, of the 500,000 new books published annually in the US, 90% sell fewer than 1,000 copies whilst 50% sell fewer than …. wait for it… 12 copies.
Quite a lot of Unherd articles like this one talk about a subject but base the article on someone’s new book. Like this one. Having read the article, I do wonder if this book will be one of the 50%.

Christopher Barclay
Christopher Barclay
5 months ago

 ” … whose masters allegedly seek to iron out all forms of distinctiveness …” A superb description not of Western governments but those of China and Iran. As for Russia it is just a gangster state calling on the country’s imperial past.

Christopher Barclay
Christopher Barclay
5 months ago

The battle of Hastings is largely ignored in English history because to analyse its consequences is to admit that the English have never been one ethnic group and as an extension to imply that the class division between aristocracy and the rest is along ethnic lines.

Ian Cooper
Ian Cooper
5 months ago

Most of us, or anyone, is alive today because of ‘white’ western medicine and is anyone grateful to 300 years of Dead, White, European Males – and Mme Curie etc- who all did quite a good job? Perhaps a bill should be sent to the rest of the world?

Michael Cavanaugh
Michael Cavanaugh
5 months ago
Reply to  Ian Cooper

I notice that those who poo-poo mere allopathic medicine, and boost indigenous healing in its place, tend to be as effective as the rest of us at birth control.

Benedict Waterson
Benedict Waterson
5 months ago

All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned.
This ideological slant towards a borderless, cultureless, neoliberal globalism, ironically comes across as a kind of inverted Communism, in the moral certainty & ideological obsessiveness of its proponents.

Ex Nihilo
Ex Nihilo
5 months ago

I stipulate that Josephine Quinn is my intellectual superior. Certainly Hypatia of Alexandria was as well. The latter was the last philosopher/mathematician/astronomer of the Neoplatonist school of philosophy in Alexandria. She was killed in 415 AD by a mob that represented the ascendant authoritarian culture that overthrew the Romans and ushered in a millennium of intellectual darkness. The Josephine Quinns of our time seem to fear and loathe above all else white males who still defiantly cherish the best precepts of traditional Western culture. Perhaps, like Hypatia, they are in far greater danger from the barbarian mob.

William Amos
William Amos
5 months ago

”Nothing really happened, nothing really existed, nobody really did anything”.
Truly the Pharisee is in the seat of Moses.
I’m surprised this sort of tilting at windmills still impresses in the academy.I have to say that from extramural point of the trick became tiresome ere lang syne.
Rather like the political ‘Far-Right-Extremism’, it is the Eurasia to the Eastasia of ‘Western-Cultural-Chauvinism’. It looms large in the Academic mind but noone else seems to have seen much of it in lived life.
Thankfully we have all the Classics of the Western Canon in cheap paperback so all the rest is irrelevant.

Andrew Boughton
Andrew Boughton
5 months ago

Nice.