The long-awaited Isaiah Berlin 'Reader' -- an anthology of his best and most representative work, drawn from a lifetime's writing by this most distinguished philosopher and historian of ideas.
WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION BY ANDREW MARR
Isaiah Berlin was one of the leading thinkers of the century, and one of the finest writers. The Proper Study of Mankind selects some of the best of his essays. The full (and enormous) range of his work is represented here, from the exposition of his most distinctive doctrine -- pluralism -- to studies of Machiavelli, Tolstoy, Churchill and Roosevelt. In these pages he encapsulates the principal movements that characterise the modern age: romanticism, historicism, Fascism, relativism, irrationalism and nationalism. His ideas are always tied to the people who conceived them, so that abstractions are brought alive. His insights both illuminate the past and offer a key to the burning issues of today.