Intellectuals
From Marx and Tolstoy to Sartre and Chomsky
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4.4 • 27 Ratings
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
"Johnson revels in all the wicked things these great thinkers have done…great fun to read." — New York Times Book Review
A fascinating portrait of the minds that have shaped the modern world. In an intriguing series of biographical essays, Rousseau, Shelley, Marx, Ibsen, Tolstoy, Hemingway, Bertrand Russell, Brecht, Sartre, Edmund Wilson, Victor Gollancz, Lillian Hellman, Cyril Connolly, Norman Mailer, James Baldwin, Kenneth Tynan, and Noam Chomsky, among others, are revealed as intellectuals both brilliant and contradictory, magnetic and dangerous.
This unflinching collection of biographical essays exposes the startling contradictions between their public pronouncements and private lives:
A History of Ideas: From Rousseau and Shelley to Sartre and Chomsky, discover the thinkers who forged the modern mind—and the often-shocking personal behavior they sought to conceal.Unflinching Cultural Criticism: Johnson pulls no punches, examining the egotism, cruelty, and dishonesty that flourished behind the celebrated public facades of figures like Marx, Tolstoy, and Hemingway.The Private Lives of Public Figures: Explore the gap between enlightened ideals and personal reality, from Rousseau’s abandonment of his children to the serial betrayals that marked the lives of so many others.A Provocative Reassessment: This classic polemic challenges readers to question the moral authority of intellectuals and reconsider the ideas we have inherited from these brilliant but deeply contradictory men.
Customer Reviews
Intellectuals
This book exposes the motivations, character, foibles, flaws, and hubris of a number of influential persons in the liberal stable. What pleased me the most about the book was how well acquainted I felt with each person in such a short treatment. I was struck with the similarity in personality traits among the group and how the effects of their personal flaws have found their way into liberal doctrines and policies pursued by the left today. I found the book engaging and intellectually stimulating. It is intimate without being sordid. It takes a somewhat judgmental tone occasionally, but there is no sugar coating intellectual dishonesty and outright lying in order to promote an insidious cause. I very much enjoyed it
Intellectuals
One reviewer above stated that this book and author is liberal and left. I beg to differ. These people and their characterizations are either and both conservative and liberal.