Description
Book SynopsisBerlin''s main theme in these essays is the importance in the history of ideas of dissenters whose thinking still challenges conventional wisdom - among them Machiavelli, Vico, Montesquieu, Herzen and Sorel. With his unusual powers of imaginative re-creation, he brings to life original minds that swam against the current of their times, and in the process offers a powerful defence of variety in our visions of life.
Roger Hausheer''s introduction surveys Berlin''s whole oeuvre, and the full bibliography of his pubication has been updated for this Pimlico edition.
Trade ReviewA most remarkable intellectual achievement. There are few books published in our time which more dazzlingly illuminate some of the most crucial problems of western culture and civilisation * Encounter *
Berlin expounds with idea of half-forgotten thinkers with luminous clarity and imaginative empathy... exhilirating to read * Observer *
The most imaginative, distinguished and erudite of historians of ideas in this country -- Anthony Quinton * Spectator *
Isaiah Berlin has a masterly grasp. He is one of the most concerned liberal minds in Europe -- V.S. Pritchett * New Statesman *
