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9781474619707 626bc6ee680cf36aff3110ad The Hedgehog And The Fox https://www.midlandbookshop.com/s/607fe93d7eafcac1f2c73ea4/626bc6ef680cf36aff3110e3/61nx0tcstal-_sx324_bo1-204-203-200_.jpg

'Brilliant. Searching and profound' E.H. Carr, Times Literary Supplement
'When reading Isaiah Berlin we breathe an altogether different air' New York Review of Books
'Beautifully written' W. H. Auden, New Yorker
'Ingenious. Exactly what good critical writing should be' Max Beloff, Guardian

The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.

For Isaiah Berlin, there is a fundamental distinction in mankind: those who are fascinated by the infinite variety of things - foxes - and those who relate everything to a central all-embracing system - hedgehogs. It can be applied to the greatest creative minds: Dante, Ibsen and Proust are hedgehogs, while Shakespeare, Aristotle and Joyce are foxes.

Yet when Berlin reaches the case of Tolstoy, he finds a fox by nature, but a hedgehog by conviction; a duality which holds the key to understanding Tolstoy's work, illuminating a paradox of his philosophy of history and showing why he was frequently misunderstood by his contemporaries and critics.

With a foreword by Michael Ignatieff
A W&N Essential

 
 

Review

Brilliant ... searching and profound - TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

This little book is so entertaining, as well as acute, that the reader hardly notices that it is learned too - OBSERVER

Very readable, with a lively honed down style - SUNDAY MERCURY

The most important study of Tolstoy's thought written in English for a long time - THE LISTENER

Delightful to read - SUNDAY TIMES

[Berlin] has a deep and subtle feeling for the puzzle of Tolstoy's personality, and he writes throughout ... with a wonderful eloquence - NEW YORK TIMES

Beautifully written and suggestive -- W H Auden - NEW YORKER

Berlin's stunning command of the resources of scholarship, his sensitivity to literature and to character, and his eloquence as a writer give this essay the lustre of a virtuoso performance - ATLANTIC

The argument is ingenious and subtle, full of overtones - exactly what good critical writing should be - GUARDIAN

very readable, with a lively honed down style - SUNDAY MERCURY

Book Description

'A dazzling tour de force. A rhetorical masterpiece, an intellectual firework display by a modern master' Robert McCrum, Guardian
Isaiah Berlin's classic essay on Tolstoy

About the Author

Sir Isaiah Berlin OM spent the whole of his professional life at Oxford, as a Fellow of All Souls College, a Fellow of New College, Chichele Professor of Social and Political theory and first President of Wolfson College. He is the author of many books and was President of the British Academy from 1974 until 1978. He died in 1997.
 
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The Hedgehog And The Fox

The Hedgehog And The Fox

ISBN: 9781474619707
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Details
  • ISBN: 9781474619707
  • Author: Isaiah Berlin
  • Publisher: W&n
  • Pages: 144
  • Format: Paperback
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Book Description

'Brilliant. Searching and profound' E.H. Carr, Times Literary Supplement
'When reading Isaiah Berlin we breathe an altogether different air' New York Review of Books
'Beautifully written' W. H. Auden, New Yorker
'Ingenious. Exactly what good critical writing should be' Max Beloff, Guardian

The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.

For Isaiah Berlin, there is a fundamental distinction in mankind: those who are fascinated by the infinite variety of things - foxes - and those who relate everything to a central all-embracing system - hedgehogs. It can be applied to the greatest creative minds: Dante, Ibsen and Proust are hedgehogs, while Shakespeare, Aristotle and Joyce are foxes.

Yet when Berlin reaches the case of Tolstoy, he finds a fox by nature, but a hedgehog by conviction; a duality which holds the key to understanding Tolstoy's work, illuminating a paradox of his philosophy of history and showing why he was frequently misunderstood by his contemporaries and critics.

With a foreword by Michael Ignatieff
A W&N Essential

 
 

Review

Brilliant ... searching and profound - TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

This little book is so entertaining, as well as acute, that the reader hardly notices that it is learned too - OBSERVER

Very readable, with a lively honed down style - SUNDAY MERCURY

The most important study of Tolstoy's thought written in English for a long time - THE LISTENER

Delightful to read - SUNDAY TIMES

[Berlin] has a deep and subtle feeling for the puzzle of Tolstoy's personality, and he writes throughout ... with a wonderful eloquence - NEW YORK TIMES

Beautifully written and suggestive -- W H Auden - NEW YORKER

Berlin's stunning command of the resources of scholarship, his sensitivity to literature and to character, and his eloquence as a writer give this essay the lustre of a virtuoso performance - ATLANTIC

The argument is ingenious and subtle, full of overtones - exactly what good critical writing should be - GUARDIAN

very readable, with a lively honed down style - SUNDAY MERCURY

Book Description

'A dazzling tour de force. A rhetorical masterpiece, an intellectual firework display by a modern master' Robert McCrum, Guardian
Isaiah Berlin's classic essay on Tolstoy

About the Author

Sir Isaiah Berlin OM spent the whole of his professional life at Oxford, as a Fellow of All Souls College, a Fellow of New College, Chichele Professor of Social and Political theory and first President of Wolfson College. He is the author of many books and was President of the British Academy from 1974 until 1978. He died in 1997.
 

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