# Quote — Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life

> The intellectual … may live for ideas, as I have said, but something must prevent him from living for one idea, from becoming obsessive or grotesque. Although there have been zealots whom we may still regard as intellectuals, zealotry is a defect of the breed and not of the essence.

- Author: [Richard Hofstadter](https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter.md)
- Book: [Anti-Intellectualism in American Life](https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life.md)
- Page: 29
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Richard_Hofstadter#Anti-Intellectualism_in_American_Life_(1963)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life/the-intellectual-may

## More from this book

> It is the historic glory of the intellectual class of the West in modern times that, of all the classes which could be called in any sense privileged, it has shown the largest and most consistent concern for the well-being of the classes which lie below it in the social scale.

p. 29 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life/it-is-the.md)

> Whatever the intellectual is too certain of, if he is healthily playful, he begins to find unsatisfactory. The meaning of his intellectual life lies not in the possession of truth but in the quest for new uncertainties.

p. 30 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life/whatever-the-intellectual.md)

> As with the pursuit of happiness, the pursuit of truth is itself gratifying whereas the consummation often turns out to be elusive.

p. 30 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/richard-hofstadter/anti-intellectualism-in-american-life/as-with-the.md)