Russian Thinkers (Penguin Philosophy) (Paperback)

by Isaiah Berlin (Author), Henry Hardy (Editor), Aileen Kelly (Editor) "THE year 1848 is not usually considered to be a landmark in Russian history..." (more)
Key Phrases: Russian Empire, Louis Blanc, Old Comrade (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Among the seven essays collected in Russian Thinkers is perhaps Isaiah Berlin's most famous work, "The Hedgehog and the Fox," which begins with an ancient Greek proverb ("The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing") before taking on Leo Tolstoy's philosophy of history, showing how Tolstoy "was by nature a fox, but believed in being a hedgehog." The other half dozen pieces examine other Russian writers and philosophers, including Alexander Herzen, Ivan Turgenev, and Mikhail Bakunin--although the latter, Berlin says, "is not a serious thinker. There are no coherent ideas to be extracted from his writings of any period, only fire and imagination, violence and poetry, and an ungovernable desire for strong sensations." Few, if any, English-language critics have written as perceptibly about Russian thought and culture as the Latvian-born Berlin, and the history covered in Russian Thinkers is a unique elaboration of Berlin's theses concerning the impact of ideas upon culture.

Review
What should be done? To the question that hung over 19th-century Russia and dogs the world today, Isaiah Berlin would answer, stand firmly uncertain. Russian-born and Oxford-bred, Berlin has almost single-handedly kept alive in the West a sense of the intellectual fervor and moral complexity of pre-Revolutionary Russian thought. In these essays of 30 years, he demonstrates, with the clarity, vividness, and precision he attributes to Tolstoy, that failure of the 1848 revolution in Western Europe forced Russian intellectuals, now isolated and insulated, "to develop a native social and political outlook," harsh, unsentimental, and ultimately uncompromising; that there exists "a great chasm between those who relate everything to a single vision. . . [and] those who pursue many ends" (in "The Hedgehog and the Fox," on Tolstoy's view of history); that Herzen and Bakunin, at one in elevating the ideal of individual liberty, divided irreparably on means, Herzen, "the sworn enemy of all systems" (and Berlin's greatest hero), holding that liberty is an absolute value not to be suppressed for the sake of future happiness or any other "huge abstraction." And, in "The Birth of the Russian Intelligentsia," he credits "the great Russian essayist Belinsky," hardly known in the West, with virtually inventing the kind of social criticism which enjoins art to be responsible to life - in the specifically Russian context, to set men free. Neatly to link Berlin's themes does not do justice, however, to the exceptional richness and suggestiveness of their development. Within a frame of reference that extends from the author of the Book of Job to D.H. Lawrence and Franklin Roosevelt, he exactly places the figures of his Russian protagonists; and each of them he portrays as an individual. Tolstoy "was by nature a fox, but he believed in being a hedgehog," and the conflict emerged in his unresolved (between determinism and free choice) view of history in War and Peace; the gentle, skeptical, tolerant Turgenev created, in Fathers and Children, the "brutal, fanatical, dedicated figure" of the agitator Bazarov; "Does he then symbolize progress?" Turgenev remained ambivalent, "the notoriously unsatisfactory, at times agonizing, position of the modern heirs of the liberal tradition" - to which Berlin wholeheartedly subscribes. An absorbing, arresting group of studies, and as important a book as will be published this year. (Kirkus Reviews) --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (October 25, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140136258
• ISBN-13: 978-0140136258
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #199,739 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Liberal Predicament, June 15, 2002

By	Mir Harven (Croatia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Russian Thinkers (Hardcover)

This is one of these intellectual & spiritual odysseys of the mind that, after you've digested them, remain embedded in the protoplasm of your mental being. All the Russian 19th century greats (except Pushkin and Dostoevsky ) are here: Herzen, Belinsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev, Bakunin. In a book so saturated with ideas, it is not easy to make a pick- my favorite ones are:

-the hedgehog and the fox metaphor ("The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing"). Human beings are categorized as either "hedgehogs" (whose lives are embodiment of a single, central vision of reality according to which they "feel", breathe, experience and think- "system addicts", in short. Examples include Plato, Dante, Proust and Nietzsche.) or "foxes" ( who live rather centrifugal than centripetal lives, pursue many divergent ends and, generally, possess a sense of reality that prevents them from formulating a definite grand system of "everything"-simply because they "know" that life is too complex to be squeezed into any Procrustean unitary scheme. Montaigne, Balzac, Goethe and Shakespeare are, in various degrees, foxes.)

-precarious position of liberalism-something Berlin was well aware of. A "non-belief belief", liberalism certainly doesn't satisfy "deeper" human needs; also, it managed, following its very nature, to stay away from planned genocides & siren songs of totalitarian power. Yet- Berlin has failed (maybe due to the "history of ideas" nature of this compilation of essays) to answer more fundamental questions plaguing liberal mindset: is it fit to grapple with the 20th/21st century burning issues ? Or- has it mutated into a dark parody of itself, making a pact with postmodern imperial power(s) as represented by X-Filesque military & financial "Free World" greedy elites which batten on the unenviable position of the much of the globe (Latin America, Africa, East Europe & the greater part of Asia) ?

-on strong side, essays on Herzen (Berlin's hero), Turgenev ("Fathers and Children" controversy) and Bakunin (juxtaposed to Herzen) are fresh, universal & not dated at all. Tolstoy is covered unsurpassably, and I doubt it can be done better. On the other hand, some essays, like those on Russia and 1848 revolutions, German Romanticism and Russian populism, although brilliantly weaven, are, in my opinion, more of historical interest than pertinent to our contemporary metastable anxiety condition.

Be as it may: this is an exquisite intellectual tapestry. Buy it.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars interesting and focused, March 26, 2000

By A Customer

It should be noted first that Isaiah Berlin knew his material backwards and forwards; the book bears the mark of exhaustive study. Russian Thinkers is a collection of essays on Russian luminaries, including Alexander Herzen, Belinsky, Tolstoy, Bakunin, and the populists (including Chernyshevsky). It would be helpful to have background knowledge about Russian history in this time period (mainly 19th century) before reading the book, but it is also intersting as a philosophical text, and Berlin expertly outlines the thought of these major figures. The main obstacle to reading this work may be Berlin's writing style, which is initially somewhat clunky (strangely, I found this to be the case mainly in his famous essay "The Hedgehog and the Fox"), but it does flow better once one gets used to it. Like all philosophical texts, though, what at first seems abstruse often proves rewarding and enriching. This book would be of interest to those who enjoy history or philosophy. (note: if you like this text, Personal Impressions is also worth a look)

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Berlin at his best - the true fox , November 11, 2004

By	Shalom Freedman "Shalom Freedman" (Jerusalem,Israel) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

This study of Russian thinkers is profound and moving. Isaiah Berlin was capable of writing about 'ideas' and their ' development' in a constantly fascinating way. His most well- known essay ' The Hedgehog and the Fox' is in this volume and it seems that Berlin himself was one of those who knew many things and wanted to know many things. His political ideas also took the shape of recognizing conflicting value systems as having validity even when those came from within a single person. Here he writes about the great Russian social and political thinkers Tolstoy, Herzen,Belinsky , Bakunin , Turgenev with characteristic insight, irony and sympathy.
This is a volume anyone interested in the history of ideas should not miss.