The Moral Imagination: From Edmund Burke to Lionel Trilling [Hardcover]

Gertrude Himmelfarb (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 7, 2006

Gertrude Himmelfarb, one of America's most distinguished intellectual historians, here explores the minds and lives of some of the most brilliant and provocative thinkers of modern times: Edmund Burke and John Stuart Mill, Benjamin Disraeli and Winston Churchill, Jane Austen and George Eliot, Charles Dickens and John Buchan, Walter Bagehot and the Knox brothers, Michael Oakeshott and Lionel Trilling. In their distinctive ways, Ms. Himmelfarb argues, they exemplify what Burke two centuries ago and Trilling most recently have called the “moral imagination.” Behind the drama of ideas that played itself out in the lives and writings of these individuals was the free play of the moral imagination. From her own long engagement with these subjects, Ms. Himmelfarb describes how each of these thinkers, coming from different traditions, responding to different concerns, writing in different genres, shared a moral passion that permeated their work. And it is the liveliness of their imaginations that makes their reflections—on politics and literature, religion and society, marriage and sex—sometimes unpredictable, often controversial, always exciting, and as illuminating and pertinent today as they were then. In this eminently readable book, Gertrude Himmelfarb captures the wit and wisdom—and foibles and frailties—of a dozen memorable writers and thinkers, statesmen among them. The Moral Imagination possesses the clarity and persuasion of Ms. Himmelfarb's best work.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The intellectuals celebrated in this pleasing collection of essays are not your father's conservatives but your great-great-grandfather's, provided he was a well-to-do English gentleman. Neocon historian Himmelfarb (One Nation, Two Cultures) specializes in Victorian Britain and profiles some of its leading writers and statesmen, along with philosophical forerunners and descendants, to probe the complexities of two centuries of conservative thought. In her subtly revisionist accounts, novelists Jane Austen, George Eliot and Charles Dickens become conservative-minded moralists; liberal philosopher John Stuart Mill emerges as a closet conservative, when not swayed by his father or wife; and "Tory Democrats" Benjamin Disraeli and Winston Churchill, both supporters of early social welfare programs, demonstrate the latent progressivism of conservative politics. Far removed from American-style free market fundamentalism, the strand of conservatism Himmelfarb traces is respectful of tradition, accepting of an organic class system softened and humanized by personal ties and manners, and suspicious of schemes to rationalize society. Despite her brief for this outlook's continued relevance, it seems less a coherent belief system than a reaction to the liberal and radical ideologies driving modernity. Still, Himmelfarb's stylish blend of literary criticism and intellectual history yields a stimulating reappraisal of a multifaceted and influential worldview. (Apr. 7)
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From Booklist

Written over the course of some 45 years, these essays radiate Himmelfarb's enjoyment of their subjects. Well they should, for they are her "appreciations" of "thinkers and writers who are eminently praiseworthy," such as political philosopher Edmund Burke, coiner of the phrase that gives the collection its title, whom Himmelfarb, responding to a student's remark, considers as an apologist (coincidental) for Judaism. And George Eliot and Jane Austen, of whose respective masterpieces Middlemarch and Emma Himmelfarb asks every reader's most urgent questions; namely, why does Dorothea marry Ladislav? and why does Mr. Knightley marry Emma? Discussions of Dickens, Disraeli, and J. S. Mill examine aspects of each that defy the usual characterizations of their social and political orientations. Perhaps the most intriguing article argues that the adventure novelist and politician John Buchan possessed a deeper, more complex social vision than such supposedly jingoist, racist romances as The Thirty-Nine Steps may suggest. Victorian essayist Walter Bagehot and Sir Winston Churchill are among the other subjects of Himmelfarb's enlightening, infectiously enthusiastic scrutiny. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Ivan R Dee (April 7, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566636248
• ISBN-13: 978-1566636247
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.9 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #690,251 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Links intellectual lives to the moral imagination, April 27, 2006

By 

D. Donovan, Editor/Sr. Reviewer "California B... (California, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Moral Imagination: From Edmund Burke to Lionel Trilling (Hardcover)

Gertrude Himmelfarb's THE MORAL IMAGINATION is a recommended pick, here linking the intellectual lives of modern thinker and literary giants with what she identifies as the 'moral imagination'. How these thinkers evolved their ideas, wrote in different traditions at different times, and shared a common moral passion which reflected in their literature makes for truly involving reading.

7 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars New Slants, August 12, 2006

By 

F. Watkins (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Moral Imagination: From Edmund Burke to Lionel Trilling (Hardcover)

G. Himmelfarb has some very different insights into the authors she discusses and puts some of the characters in the novels in new lights. I have enjoyed reading this book and she has prodded me into reading further in the authors discussed. I would recommend this book to any persons interested in changing the 'moral tone' of American today.