Why do we often have a fascination for the grisly facts of warfare? Is it because our behaviour in war reveals something about the truth of human nature? We find elements of the highest courage, heroism, self-sacrifice and utter brutality, cruelty, sadism, destructiveness. The outline of these features seem to stand out so much more […]
Victorian poet Arthur Hugh Clough (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Hugh_Clough) trod that ever- so-delicate path between faith and doubt that 20th century philosopher Anthony Kenny came to do himself. Both also had a connection with Liverpool and Balliol College. Kenny has immersed himself in the mind of Clough in order to deliver this ‘life’. He regards Clough’s religious verse as the finest
Arthur Hugh Clough Read More »
Cosmologists tell us that the Universe is 13.75 billion years old (roughly!). It’s not that I’m disinclined to believe this. What is staggering is the ingenuity that it must have taken to work this out. John Gribbin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gribbin) and (http://www.johngribbinbooks.com/) tells the story in this most useful book. In the 19th century astronomers, geologists and evolutionists first
Mid-Victorian Britain was a period of enormous confidence and economic expansion for Britain. Geoffrey Best (http://www.britac.ac.uk/fellowship/elections/2003/best_g.cfm) gives us a history of great lucidity and readability. The Great Exhibition of 1851 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Exhibition) in fact represented the high-water mark of Victorian society, and the two decades which followed form one of the most fascinating and fruitful areas of British
Mid-Victorian Britain 1851-75 Read More »
There used to be a widely held view in Western Europe that we were the ‘civilised’ peoples and that less advanced peoples were savages. It was all very much Dr Livingstone taking the light of the Gospel and truth out to darkest Africa. Well, they certainly got the Gospel and we got the land. This view pertained
The Cambridge Companion to Lévi-Strauss Read More »
David E. Cooper, Professor of Philosopy at Durham, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_E_Cooper) has put together this volume of writings about the theory of beauty. Possibly on the esoteric side, nevertheless whole academic careers have been devoted to it. Authors represented are Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Hume, Kant, Schiller, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Tolstoy, Bell, Dewey, Heidegger and Collingwood. Hume and Schopenhauer are
Aesthetics: the classic readings by David E. Cooper Read More »
Before the microscope thinkers had speculated about what the world is made of at the minutest level. The miroscope introduced evidence for the first time and it has revolutionised our knowledge of the world and the organisms that inhabit it. In the seventeenth century the pioneering work of two scientists, the Dutchman Antonie van Leeuwenhoek and
The story of the Medici (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medici) in Florence is one of intense power struggles and patronage of sublime art works which have made the city into a world class treasure trove of beautiful paintings, sculpture and architecture. This is a fascinating recent account which should leave you spellbound. Next thing – go and visit Florence for
Florence and the Medici Read More »
It’s a contentious matter as to which of Shakespeare’s plays is the greatest. Some say ‘King Lear’, others say ‘Hamlet’. For my money ‘Measure for Measure’ is right up there, but ‘The Tempest’ is the greatest play. It was the last to be written and seems to encapsulate the Bard’s best wisdom. Here, for example, is
The ‘Tempest’ and its travels by Peter Hulme Read More »
