Customer Reviews

Firing Line with William F. Buckley Jr. "The Culture of the Left"

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I had hoped to find Malcolm Muggeridge more thought-provoking 40 years later and was rewarded. Not only is this the first Firing Line encounter with this formidable defender of Christianity since Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, taped in the Savoy Hotel in England, but one of the most challenging to keep up with. Beginning with liberalism and the Left and the noteable shadings of meaning between Mr. Buckely and Mr. Muggeridge as to their own homelands, they both take off covering good and evil, Anglican church foibles, the relevance of the New Testament gospels etc.; the disillusion and wanderings of youth via transcendentalism, the Beatles and meditation; Harold Wilson, Gladstone, Conrad Adenauer. Unexpectedly into this exploration of spirituality Mr. Buckley uttered one of his startling phrases that I had read in one of his books,"immenatize the eschaton," that caused no pause in the absorbing exchange of information between the devout Mr. Buckley and this illumator from the British Isles. Not only will this discussion whet your appetite for more Muggeridge clarity on Christianity, but you will observe and hear one of Mr. Buckley's most impressive put-downs of youthful naivete in the closing question period with some university students who were suspiciously sensitive about Mr. Muggeridge's criticism about the Maharishi. A delicious repartee worthy of Edward Everett Horton, no less. Levels above talk show fare today.