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My Father Bertrand Russell Paperback – March 1, 1996

by Katharine Tait (Author)

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Paperback: 213 pages
Publisher: St Augustine Pr Inc; 75 edition (March 1, 1996)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1855063905
ISBN-13: 978-1855063907
Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.5 x 8.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 9.8 ounces
Average Customer Review: 5 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,035,378 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2541 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Professionals & Academics > Philosophers
- #10040 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Philosophy > Modern

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R. Thomas

A sad and compelling story to me

August 3, 2017

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

A sad and compelling story to me. The daughter off a renowned atheist/agnostic tried to find love and meaning in her family as she grew up in a confused progressive world.

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RoosterFitly

basically intimate from daughter's perspective

June 5, 2013

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

With a surprise of sorts at the end of the book, the account is intimate, as one expects from a daughter. well written, giving some insight to the popular Bertrand Russell and his oscillating family life. quality of the book as shipped, fine!

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RUSSELL'S ONLY DAUGHTER WRITES ABOUT HER FATHER

January 28, 2013

Format: Paperback

Katherine ["Kate"] Tait (born 1923) is the daughter of Bertrand Russell and his second wife Dora Black. She became an essayist, and married a Christian minister. She said in the Preface to this 1975 book, "What was it like, having Bertrand Russell for a father? Was he stern, remote, analytical? Did he demand absolute quiet while he wrestled with philosophical conundrums and wrote his innumerable books? Was he too lofty to concern himself with the trivial affairs of his children? What was he really like? I have been asked such questions all my life and have struggled vainly to provide concise and honest answers." (Pg. xvii)

She suggests, "my father suffered from appalling nightmares, which caused him to fear for his own sanity and left him with a horror of madness that later made it extremely difficult for him to deal competently with the breakdown of his eldest son [John]." (Pg. 41) She observes, "When he ceased to love a woman, he ceased to love her totally, and usually he wanted no more to do with her." (Pg. 42; Russell was married four times, and had numerous affairs.)

She confides, "There were five barren years, from 1934 to 1939... They were the unhappiest years of my life, a time of settled misery so deep and pervasive that I was barely conscious of it. The parents whose help I needed seemed always to be wanting mine instead.. I wished they could see us as ourselves, not as part of the battle with the other parent. Sometimes I felt we were never ourselves to them, but embodiments of a cause: first in their fight against convention, and then in the fight against each other." (Pg. 131-132)

She admits, "My father had taught us that economic inequality was unfair, yet he himself accepted it all his life and never entirely freed himself from the aristocratic habits of his upbringing. He never identified with servants and underlings (as I did) or felt their humiliation and deprivation as his own. He did what he could, from his superior position, to improve their lot, but he did not feel it wrong to live well while they could not... I wish that I had been able to discuss all this with my father... but by the time it became a problem to me, I had stopped talking with him about important things." (Pg. 140)

She argues, "I believe myself that his whole life was a search for God, or, for those who prefer less personal terms, for absolute certainty." (Pg. 184) She adds, "I would have liked to convince my father that I had found what he had been looking for, the ineffable something he had longed for all his life. I would have liked to persuade him that the search for God does not have to be vain. But it was hopeless. He had known too many blind Christians, bleak moralists who sucked the joy from life and persecuted their opponents; he would never have been able to see the truth they were hiding. He should have been a saint... Perhaps he was a saint, even without the faith. God's gadfly, sent to challenge the smugness of the churches with a righteousness greater than their own. I could not have persuaded him, could not even talk to him about religion. All I could do was trust him to God's care, knowing that God loved him more than I did and would do what was best for him." (Pg. 189) Of his death, she added, "he has arrived with God and is getting all his questions answered at last, and someday I shall be there too..." (Pg. 201)

Somewhat disappointing (owing to her lack of communication with her father), this book nevertheless gives some interesting insights into the "private" side of Russell's life.

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Nat More

Insipid book

May 13, 2011

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

Sort of insipid book. Failed to give any significant insight into Russell's personal life. Not enough coherence in the narrative.

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D. Kovacs

One of the most astonishing memoirs of a childhood plagued by "gifted" and very modern parents

July 26, 2011

Format: Paperback

Far from insipid, this memoir gave me an entirely new picture of the marriage and
child-rearing choices made by Bertrand Russell and his extremely progressive
second wife, Dora Black. This book does not blame and is not self-pitying -- in fact,
her courage and honesty shine through as she reveals what it was like to live with
the ideals that her parents tried and failed to live up to. She does not pretend that
she is superior to her parents -- but she shows that everything they thought of as
repressive (faithful marriage, an unbroken two-parent home, and religious practice)
can be great sources of strength and love, even when you can't live them out perfectly.
A book highly recommended for its truth-telling, humility, and forgiveness -- as she says, her
parents obviously did the best that they knew how, which is all anyone can do.

5 people found this helpful6 people found this helpful

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My Father Bertrand Russell Paperback – March 1, 1996

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My Father Bertrand Russell Paperback – March 1, 1996

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