Description
Book SynopsisDisenchanted Wanderer is the first comprehensive English-language study in over half a century of the life and ideas of Konstantin Nikolaevich Leontiev (18311891), one of the most important thinkers in nineteenth-century Russia on political, social, and religious matters. Glenn Cronin gives the reader a broad overview of Leontiev''s life and varied career as novelist, army doctor, diplomat, journalist, censor, and, late in life, ordained monk.
Reviewing Leontiev''s creative work and his writing on aesthetics and literary criticismnotable figures such as Belinsky, Turgenev, Gogol, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy appearCronin goes on to examine Leontiev''s sociopolitical writing and his theory of the rise and fall of cultures and civilizations, placing his thought in the context of his contemporaries and predecessors including Hegel, Herzen, and Nietzsche, as well as Danilevsky, Pobedonostsev, and other major figures in Slavophile and Russian nationalist circles.
Trade Review
Glenn Cronin offers a meticulously researched, nuanced study of Leontiev's life and thought, providing the reader with a remarkably comprehensive insight into one of Russia's most original thinkers
* Russian Review *
While Leontiev alone will not be enough to understand Russia under Putin, the book is indeed a timely reevaluation of Leontiev and it is the first comprehensive study of his life and ideas in English since 1967.The book offers a well-written, easy-to-follow introduction to Leontiev for specialists in Russian history and nonspecialists alike
* AB IMPERIO *
[I]t is worth noting that Cronin's eloquent and engaging prose softens the otherwise formidable density of his subject matter.Cronin's book offers an insight into Leontiev the writer.
Table of ContentsIntroduction
Part One: "Beauty is Truth, Truth Beauty"
1. The Divided Self
2. The Best of All Possible Worlds
3. The Gathering Storm
4. Desperate Times
Part Two: A Prophet in His Own Country
5. Russians, Greeks, and Slavs
6. The Social Organism
7. Blood is Not Enough
8. The Tide of History
Part Three: Apocalypse
9. The Beginning of Wisdom
10. The Grand Inquisitor
11. Reactionary or Revolutionary?
12. The Feudalism of the Future
13. The Red Czar
Epilogue
