From Antal Szerb’s The Pendragon Legend (pg. 178):
“I really don’t understand you. I’d so much rather be in your position. To devote one’s life to scholarship … to truth, and the service of mankind …”
“You may rest assured that my personal scholarship has never served mankind. Because there is no such thing as justice, no universal humanity. There are only versions of justice and different sorts of people. And it has always given me particular pleasure that my own scholarly efforts, let’s say, in the field of old English ironworking, have never been of the slightest use to anyone.”
“You speak like someone who has no ideals.”
“True. I am a neo-frivolist.”
“And how does that differ from old-fashioned frivolity?”
“Mostly in the ‘neo’ prefix. It makes it more interesting.”
Extracts 