Peter Kreeft Quote

The literary establishment in England was stunned, shocked, and scandalized by an event of millennial significance when a major bookstore chain innocently polled English-speaking readers, asking them to choose the greatest book of the twentieth century. By a wide margin The Lord of the Rings won. Three times the poll was broadened: to a worldwide readership, into cyberspace via Amazon.com, and even to the greatest book of the millennium. The same champion won each time. The critics retched and kvetched, wailed and flailed, gasped and grasped for explanations. One said that they had failed and wasted their work of ed-u-ca-tion. Why bother teaching them to read if they're going to read that?

Peter Kreeft

The literary establishment in England was stunned, shocked, and scandalized by an event of millennial significance when a major bookstore chain innocently polled English-speaking readers, asking them to choose the greatest book of the twentieth century. By a wide margin The Lord of the Rings won. Three times the poll was broadened: to a worldwide readership, into cyberspace via Amazon.com, and even to the greatest book of the millennium. The same champion won each time. The critics retched and kvetched, wailed and flailed, gasped and grasped for explanations. One said that they had failed and wasted their work of ed-u-ca-tion. Why bother teaching them to read if they're going to read that?

Related Quotes

About Peter Kreeft

Peter John Kreeft (; born March 16, 1937) is a professor of philosophy at Boston College and The King's College. A convert to Roman Catholicism, he is the author of over eighty books on Christian philosophy, theology and apologetics. He also formulated, together with Ronald K. Tacelli, Twenty Arguments for the Existence of God in their Handbook of Christian Apologetics.