I have always said that it is precisely at moments of economic difficulty when politicians emerge who want to take advantage of widespread discontent… - John Elliott

I think one of the things that it is most important for historians to do is to deconstruct myths, and that when you get nationalist historiography, as in Serbia for instance, casting people in the role of permanent victims, and creating a very narrow focus, that’s really dangerous. It seems to me that our role is constantly to question the orthodoxy of the day.

In this globalized world, there is no such thing as independence.

...In Oxford there was and is an enormous commitment to individual teaching, or teaching in very small numbers, and a real interest in the intellectual development of undergraduates.