Gentle Regrets: Thoughts From a Life - Hardcover

Scruton, Roger

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0826471315 ISBN 13: 9780826471314

Publisher: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd., 2006

Synopsis

These autobiographical essays are the nearest Roger Scruton has ever got to writing a full autobiography. Written as always in beautiful and limpid prose, they show rare insight into the mind and personality of one of the most admired and yet often monstrously reviled intellectuals of our time. In this new book, Roger Scruton presents a series of autobiographical essays - the nearest he has come yet to writing an autobiography. Arranged thematically rather than chronologically, Scruton discusses and describes the people and issues that have mattered to him most. At Cambridge, Scruton became part of the group of intellectuals under the influence of Maurice Cowling, the historian. It would be a misnomer to describe them simply as 'right wing' but they are thought of as such. The group included John Vincent, the historian, Edward Norman, the theologian and historian. It was a group of people that influenced a new generation of thinkers including Charles Moore, former editor of The Daily Telegraph and the Chief Rabbi, Dr Jonathan Sacks. As Scruton's academic career developed, so did his career as a journalist and critic. As he recounts in this book, he became increasingly disenchanted with the academic world but came to enjoy a growing reputation as a perceptive and pungent critic of modern society and its moral values - especially as advocated by the so-called politically correct. He now lives entirely from his pen and delights his admirers by writing about subjects as varied as Wagner, the Pet Shop Boys, animal rights and the freedom of the individual. Here he covers these topics but also includes touching and illuminating accounts of his friendships and influences - with Iris Murdoch and John Bayley, Mary Warnock and Robin Holloway, among others.

About this title

Review:

'...Roger Scruton so distinctive a figure on the British intellectual landscape...extraordinary range of his interests and sympathies - aesthetics, architecture, farming, hunting, literature, music, philosophy and, above all, religion...very fine book, brimming with humanity and intelligence, and beautifully produced by one of Britain's most interesting publishers...amiable and thoughtful...succinct...remarkable representative of English high culture...elegant book'--Michael Burleigh "Literary Review " 'A splendid book, often moving, often funny, disconcertingly humble but also full of passionate indignation and satire... fascinating.' Tablet 'In this vivid confessional, Scruton incarnates ideas throughout in autobiographical events... by completely integrating the ideas into the personal narrative, the author creates a new and vital form which is beyond both scholarly dissertation and personal memoir... read this book and be eoncuraged... an excitement and a joy from cover to cover.' New Criticism ."..a penetrating self-examination that is oftenremorseless and poignant, while presenting what may be the finest contemporaryexample of one man's resistance to 'personal and social disorders of this age."- "Philosophy Now" 'Gentle Regrets, his memoir, is far more than a collection of fertile ideas: it's the colourful story of a learned man's life and the argued attempt to help other reclaim treasures of mind and soul that are being relegated to the discard bin....Scruton has produced a minor classic, a searching treatment of his own spirit in conflict with the spirit of age.' David Castronovo, Commonweal, September 2006 'The record of an extraordinary life...contains many memorable portraits of Scruton's friends, teachers, inspirations, antagonists...the central teaching of this wise and companionable book is that the acknowledgement of loss is not the end the prelude to the possession of joy.'--, ."..a penetrating self-examination that is often remorseless and poignant, while presenting what may be the finest contemporary example of one man's resistance to 'personal and social disorders of this age." - "Philosophy Now" a very fine book, brimming with humanity and intelligence--, "Literary Review " '[A] book of unforgettable reflections on childhood, schooling, music, opera, religion and love...[a] highly personal series of wistful reflections.' Times Literary Supplement, A. N. Wilson, 18/08/2006--, "Times Literary Supplement " Mentioned in review in Catholic Insight (June 2007)--, Scruton is an English philosopher best known for vigorously defending traditional culture in works like "England: An Elegy" and "The Meaning of Conservatism." His latest book assembles twelve "autobiographical excursions" into a composite account of his intellectual development. In addition to neatly expository essays ("How I Discovered Culture") and a sequence of poems entitled "Miss Hap," the collection includes a reminiscence of the "sleeping cities" of the Eastern bloc and an acute meditation on beauty and religious faith. The blunt wit for which Scruton is known is scarce here, but lyric suits him almost as well as polemic. Such passages as the evocation of a chapel filled with the "soft smell of stone that has grown old in shadow" vividly illuminate the moral import of aesthetic values. The New Yorker .".."Gentle Regrets", Scruton's wistful, magnanimous, and ineluctably intelligent memoir."- "National Review, "March 27, 2006--, '..beguilling memoirs'--, "Independent, The " '..beguilling memoirs'--Jonathan Ree "Independent, The "

About the Author:

Roger Scruton is a philosopher and writer. Formerly Professor of Aesthetics at Birkbeck College, London and Visiting Professor at Boston College, he now lives in Wiltshire and writes full time.

About this edition

• Publisher: Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd.
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 0826471315
• ISBN 13: 9780826471314
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256