Isaiah Berlin: A Life

Ignatieff, Michael

ISBN 10 : 0805063005 ISBN 13 : 9780805063004

Editeur : Owl Books, 1999

Synopsis

Book by Ignatieff Michael

A propos du livre

Quatrième de couverture :

'A work of literature and an eloquent portrait...an explanation of this most remarkable twentieth-century figure...Though Berlin will be the subject of many future studies, one cannot imagine anyone feeling the need to improve on this biography' Observer

One of the greatest of modern philosophers, Isaiah Berlin was swept up in the most powerful currents of the twentieth century. In this extraordinary biography, Michael Ignatieff traces Berlin's childhood in Latvia, amid the terror of the Revolution, his exile in England and years as a member of the British intellectual establishment, and his career at the heart of British diplomacy in airtime Washington and post-war Moscow. The story echoes with Berlin's zestful recollections; from his comic meetings with Virginia Woolf, Wittgenstein and Churchill to his encounters with Pasternak and Anna Akhmatova.

'Enthralling...More than an authorised biography...An affectionate and admiring, but none the less independently-minded portrait...A serious book, but also a vivid, lively and uplifting one'

Evening Standard

'Reading Ignatieff's Isaiah Berlin, you feel you are understanding not only Isaiah Berlin, but the history...I do not see how there could be a more insightful, more erudite, biography of this remarkable man' Doris Lessing, Times Literary Supplement

'A rare gem of a book...It will add a new dimension to the afterlife of the philosopher' Sunday Times

'Brings off the near-impossible - a lifelike portrait of a man who was loved by his friends not for what he wrote, but what he said' Humphrey Carpenter, Sunday Times, Books of the Year

Présentation de l'éditeur :

Isaiah Berlin refused to write an autobiography, but he agreed to talk about himself - and so for ten years, he allowed Michael Ignatieff to interview him. Isaiah Berlin (1909-97) was one of the greatest and most humane of modern philosophers; historian of the Russian intellgentisia biographer of Marx, pioneering scholar of the Romantic movement and defender of the liberal idea of freedom. His own life was caught up in the most powerful currents of the century. The son of a Riga timber merchant, he witnessed the Russian Revolution, was plunged into suburban school life and the ferment of 1930s Oxford; he became part of the British intellectual establishment During the war, he as at the heart of Anglo-American diplomacy in Washington; afterwards in Moscow he saw the grim despair of Stalinism. The book is full of memorable meetings - with Virginia Woolf and Sigmund Freud, with Churchill, with Boris Pasternak and Anna Akhmatova. Yet Ignatieff is not afraid to delve into Berlin's conflicts: his jewish idealism, his deep aspirations. This is a work of great subtelty and penetration, exhilarating and intimate, powerful and profound.

À propos de cette édition

• Éditeur: Owl Books
• Date d'édition: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0805063005
• ISBN 13: 9780805063004
• Reliure: Livre broché
• Nombre de pages: 356