Intellectuals

Johnson, Paul

ISBN 10: 1857990110 / ISBN 13: 9781857990119

Published by Orion Publishing, London, UK, 1993

About this Item

Clean, tight, unmarked; slight wear to edges; otherwise spine straight and uncreased; appears unread; Paul Johnson examines whether intellectuals are morally fit to give advice to humanity. In essence, do their private practices match the standard of their public principles? Rousseau, Shelley, Marx, Ibsen, Tolstoy, Hemingway, Bertand Russell, Brecht, Sartre, Edmund Wilson, Victor Gollancz, Lillian Hellman, Cyril Connolly, Norman Mailer, Kenneth Tynan and many others are put under the spotlight. With wit brilliance, Johnson exposes these intellectuals, and questions whether ideas should ever be valued more than individuals. Seller Inventory # 008398

Bibliographic Details

Title: Intellectuals

Publisher: Orion Publishing, London, UK

Publication Date: 1993

Binding: Soft cover

Condition: Very Good

About this title

Synopsis:

Phoenix Books 1st. Edition

Review:

Veteran political commentator, scholar and former editor of The New Statesman Paul Johnson has collected all the nasty, cruel and disgusting episodes in the lives of the mighty dead in order to question their "moral and judgmental credentials to give advice to humanity on how to conduct its affairs."

Intellectuals, according to Johnson, often possess a defining set of characteristic traits; they are lying, cheating, hypocritical, megalomaniacs who combine an abstract love of humanity with an exploitative, selfish and cruel treatment of those who were closest to them. Rousseau, Shelley, Marx, Ibsen, Tolstoy, Hemingway, Bertrand Russell, Brecht, Sartre, Lillian Hellman, Norman Mailer and Kenneth Tynan are put under the spotlight and damned as moral exemplars and truth-tellers while Edmund Wilson, Evelyn Waugh and Orwell provide the necessary foil of intellectual integrity.

This is a voyeuristic, gossip-mongering, ruthless and completely compelling book that leaves a bad taste in the mouth if you consume it at one sitting. Fortunately--since it's a collection of short biographical essays or exposès one can dip in where one likes. Intellectuals is well researched and has the polished concision one might expect from a veteran journalist and scholar. It also has the advantage of dealing with subject matter that is fascinating in itself--the extravagant personalities and spectacular immoralities of some of our most revered figures. Intellectuals doesn't always work as dispassionate intellectual history--for instance the overview of intellectual trends since the 1960s in the final chapter "The Flight of Reason" seems forced--but as a set of exposès it is splendid. --Larry Brown