From Library Journal
This book comprises a revised version of the late author's 1967 William James Lectures, published for the first time; reprints of 12 papers, some slightly revised; and a 1987 retrospective commentary on three aspects of the papers. The lectures are a detailed examination of assertion, implication, and meaning; and the papers discuss ordinary language philosophy, meaning, conversational implicature, the philosophy of perception, and metaphysics. In the lectures, Grice emphasizes that language serves many important functions besides scientific inquiry, distinguishes different sorts of meaning, and theorizes about the kinds of implication that our utterances exemplify in ordinary conversation. The papers analyze numerous topics, including different kinds of meaning. Grice's writing is pellucidly clear, his analyses subtle, and his arguments detailed and rigorous. For all major philosophy collections.
- Robert Hoffman, York Coll., CUNYCopyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
Grice was a miniaturist who changed the way other people paint big canvases. The question of correct scale is ultimately one of intellectual judgment, and in this his magisterial, fastidious prose rebukes those of us who want to move faster. [His] work culminated in the William James lectures delivered at Harvard in 1967, and philosophers will he grateful for having them finally available in one volume,
Studies in the Way of Words, together with many other of Grice's papers, and a retrospective epilogue, written within two years of his death.
--Simon Blackburn (
Times Literary Supplement )
Some philosophers are important because they have produced an important article or an important theory; others are important because, in addition to producing articles and theories, they have minds that "scintillate" in a certain way. Grice is a philosopher of this second and greater type... Grice's intellect, power, and charm are all vehicles for conveying a vision of philosophy, a vision that has much to say to analytic philosophers today.
--Hilary Putnam, Harvard University
In interest and power this book far exceeds most publications of our time.
--P. F. Strawson (
Synthése )
