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The example of history seems to have shown that rule by philosopher-kings is more likely to be the worst and most tyrannical form of government. There have been few, if any, actual kings who have been philosophers or philosophers who have been kings, to be sure, but governments ruled by an inner vision of perfect justice have proved to be devastating in terms of human lives and freedom.
The history of the twentieth century ought to have proved that beyond any doubt. Despite the example of history and common sense, there remains a class of individuals who believe that they and they alone, possess the inner vision needed to reform or remake society into a utopia of perfect justice. These individuals have seldom possessed political power, but through their writings and thoughts have had an enormous influence on the society around them.
These individuals are often referred to as intellectuals. Paul Johnson profiles a few of these overly influential people in his book Intellectuals.
As Johnson notes at the beginning, there have always been people who have held themselves as having a special capacity to determine proper behavior and beliefs and to use this capacity to enlighten their neighbors. These intellectuals, generally priests or teachers were limited by tradition or official doctrine. A preacher could try to create heaven on Earth, but his view of Heaven was determined by scripture or tradition.
Beginning in the eighteenth century, the influence of religion in the West declined, and the cleric was gradually replaced by the secular intellectual. These secular intellectuals were quite different from their predecessors. Rather than upholding traditional rules and authority, these new intellectuals sought to tear down the old to make way for a new world based upon their inner visions of justice and reason. It is these people that Johnson writes about. These individuals have been very different in their ideas and lives, yet there are some striking similarities, as Johnson notes.
These intellectuals all believed that they should not be bound by the same rules as others. Instead, they needed complete freedom from mundane cares to work out their ideas.
One might argue that a thinker ought to be judged by the quality of his ideas rather than the sordidness of his private life. The private lives of these intellectuals were either a reflection of their philosophy, in which case that life shows the real-life effects of that philosophy, or they were unable to live up to the ideals of their philosophy, which implies that perhaps no human being could live up to such ideals.
A conservative intellectual, would perhaps, be more inclined to defend and preserve traditional institutions rather than tear them down to be remade. One exception to this rule might be the example of Ayn Rand. It is a pity that Paul Johnson did not include her with the intellectuals since the unrealism of some aspects of her philosophy and her wretched treatment of most of her associated made her a better example than some of the people he did include.
I have no complaints about Intellectuals, however. It is a book that anyone who believes that the right sort of ideas or the right sort of people could usher in a perfect world would do well to read this book. Posting Komentar. Most helpful customer reviews of people found the following review helpful. The people being skewered all are of the left-ist persuasion, but it is still a juicy and fun read, because who doesn't like see the ugly side of famous people, especially famous people who might have a tendency to be holier-than-thou, condemn others and feel that they have some big insight into the world that has given them all the answers.
The book was written in the waning days of the Cold War, right as the thaw was about to set in, and it's difficult at times to keep that fact in mind as reading some of the things here.
Some of the book has aged a little poorly, for example Lillian Hellman had just recently died and Johnson predicted that her cult would live on. I don't think anyone these days gives two shits about Hellman's politics, and she might have ruled over the New York intellectual scene at one point, but now she's just that woman who has one copy of a couple of her plays carried in Barnes and Noble and is remembered for her legendary spat with Mary McCarthy.
The overarching criticism leveled at most of the people featured in this book is that they profess a great love for humanity, they are self-described as being filled with love and compassion, a sense of justice, an outrage at exploitation, etc; but in their personal lives they show very little compassion, they treat other people like garbage, they have a tendency to almost pathologically lie, and this isn't surprising they have that parental problem of basically saying, do as I say not as I do.
The writers who get their lives scrutinized here? Before I get into some of the dirt, I should make a few comments on some of these selections. One, a few of them probably shouldn't have been included. I think it's a real stretch of the imagination to call Hemingway an 'intellectual'. He dabbled in being committed to the CP in the 's, but he wasn't really out there creating over-arching ideas about how society should be run.
Johnson seems to feel the discomfort of including him, and seems to rationalize his inclusion because of Hemingway's 'pagan' life-style. Atheism is something that Johnson isn't too fond of. I already mentioned Hellman. Chomsky is also a curious inclusion, he seems to be included mainly for his political stance but there is little 'dirt' given, except for an example of some questionable justifications he gave and revised over genocide in Cambodia It's not happening, It's not as bad as they say, It did happen but it's Americas fault.
Edmund Wilson is at best a fellow traveller of the CP, and even during his infatuation with Communism he stands apart from most of the other people featured in this book by staying intellectually honest.
Bunny falls into the same problem that is easily leveled at a lot of left-wing people in the 30's, they choose to support Communism without an awareness of what Stalin was doing to his own people at the time. Many would have serious misgivings about Stalin as it became difficult to ignore the facts of his brutality. Except in the case of someone like Sartre who went against the stream and didn't give a shit about the CP when it was fashionable, but threw his hat in to support Stalin as everyone else was backing away and feeling slightly ashamed of themselves.
My two favorite chapters were probably the ones attacking Rousseau and Tolstoy. Maybe it's because they are probably two of the most inflated examples of moral self-righeousness presented in the book. It's not really surprising to hear how say, Brecht was an asshole, or that Hemingway was a drunk.
It was curious to hear that Marx had probably never stepped foot in a factory in his whole life, and that much of the facts he used in Capital were from decades old government reports that didn't reflect on what present working conditions were like, and that maybe the only exploited laborer he knew personally was his maid who he impregnated, forced the child into an orphanage and oh yeah, who was never paid a cent for the work she did in the Marx home.
I thought maybe I'd relate a bunch of episodes from various lives but now I'm having some trouble deciding what to pick. There is so much slanderous gossip here, much of it taken from letters and journals of the authors. You do get quite a bit of strange dishonesty from the authors portrayed here. For example, there is Bertrand Russell angrily denying that he ever advocated using nuclear weapons to destroy the Soviet Union in the days before they developed their own atomic weapons, even in the face of being shown that he had written articles and essays advocating this at least one of them he even published in his collection, Unpopular Essays.
Another common theme is bizarre sexually open relationships with spouses, it's not necessarily bizarre that someone would want to sleep with people other then their spouse, but the number of the intellectuals in the book who followed this practice and didn't just cheat, but did it with an 'openness' policy that results in probably more hurtfulness than if the infidelity had been carried out in a more traditional bourgeois manner.
Maybe someday soon I'll return to this review. It's fun reading though for people who want to have a dosage of some gossip but can't read the weekly Hollywood gossip magazines because they are too culturally stupid to know who half of the people on the covers of them are. View all 8 comments. Jan 11, Gary Beauregard Bottomley rated it did not like it.
This is not a book about why each of the profiled intellectuals profiled are worthy of being remembered, but it's mostly how they are flawed human beings. The author would pick an intellectual, barely explain why they are important today, and then dwell on the persons foibles to a churlish degree making the listener lose sight of why the person is of interest today. Does the author really know that Marx had "anger in his heart" but didn't really act on it? Sometimes it can help to understand the This is not a book about why each of the profiled intellectuals profiled are worthy of being remembered, but it's mostly how they are flawed human beings.
Sometimes it can help to understand the artist philosopher, writer, poet, Give me the complete package of the intellectuals but don't think you've denigrated their body of work by denigrating the person. Hemingway was a dick, but boy, could he write! We know him for his writing not for his life. Yes, we can better understand his writing by understanding the man, but his dickish behavior doesn't negate his writing. I really despised this approach to story telling. It was not about what the intellectuals thought or why they are special.
It is about why they are flawed humans. Besides is it really flawed not to believe in supernatural transcendental beings based on no real evidence? The author seemed to think most of his subjects were flawed because they saw the world in human terms. Using the author's modus operandi, I could explain how he would describe the great intellectual thinker Jesus. He would first say something about the sermon on the mount and the golden rule and how that revolutionized thought, and then he would say that Jesus said he came to separate families, went to a temple and kicked out money lenders and violently whipped them, and suggested people not wash their hands before eating even though germs can cause disease.
Then the author would end the story by casting more doubt on Jesus' intellectual works because of his personnel behavior since when his mother and brothers ask him for help he shouted "who is my mother, who are my brothers" Matthew The author really seemed to like taking things out of context and I had a feeling that he was more interested in telling his point of view if it supported his dislike for the person with the implication that the art itself is just as bad.
I did not finish the book. I finish almost all of my books, but enough was enough. I thought he would change his formula. But he did not. If I weren't so lazy I would have gotten my credit back on this anti-intellectual, anti-humanist bore of a book. View all 18 comments. A book that is devastating to many of those that modern thinkers hold in high esteem, such as Rousseau, Marx, Tolstoy, Sarte and Brecht.
Johnson knows a lot, has studied a lot, and is willing to call these men and one woman what they were: mean, greedy for fame and often money, immoral, hateful towards women and children, and above all persistent liars. Truth for them was malleable, especially when their reputation was at stake. One reviewer said that Johnson ignored their good contributions, A book that is devastating to many of those that modern thinkers hold in high esteem, such as Rousseau, Marx, Tolstoy, Sarte and Brecht.
One reviewer said that Johnson ignored their good contributions, which is not true. He notes that if Tolstoy has stuck to writing he would have been fine.
He says that Hemingway's devotion to his craft was unsurpassed. But the point of the book is that they did not just write or speak. They thought they were messiahs who had some special destiny to guide humanity in truth. The theme is not what they did well, but how their lives were staunchly immoral, despite their accomplishments. As I look around our world the thoughts and ideas of these men still echo, but it has shifted to Hollywood.
Today it is not philosophy professors or even playwrights who shape thinking, but actors, directors, and the movies they make. Fascination with sexual freedom, the love of money, the shading of the truth in the name of Humanity, the desire to identify with the workers, excusing violence when it accomplishes their ends, and the vicious intolerance of all opposing viewpoints was characteristic of intellectuals and is now characteristic of Hollywood and our ruling class in general.
Unfortunately, Johnson's book assumes, what can no longer be assumed, a standard of right and wrong that has long since be lost. Most who read it today will be fascinated, but ultimately will say, "So what that Hemingway was a drunk adulterer? Who cares that Marx lied? Who cares that men claimed to be pacifists, but often supported violence to accomplish their goals?
What is that to me? I like their books and their ideas and their movies. And isn't my opinion and feelings what really matters? View 1 comment. View all 9 comments. Mar 12, Dfordoom rated it it was amazing Shelves: non-fiction , politics.
He looks at a selection of intellectuals from Rousseau to Noam Chomsky and sees some disturbing common patterns. They achieve a certain eminence in a particular field Bertrand Russell in mathematics, Chomsky in linguistics, Shelley, Tolstoy and James Baldwin in literature and then decide they are uniquely qualified to refashion civilisation.
Since their understanding of the world of politics and of the behaviours and motivations of real people are fatally inadequate they succumb to the temptation to ignore real people and the real world and to put ideas before people.
When people fail to react in the desired manner the intellectuals become embittered and increasingly extreme. Believing that they have all the answers they convince themselves that they do not need to bother with troublesome distractions like facts, and that they are justified in lying in the service of the higher truths that they have glimpsed. Lying becomes second nature to them. An almost total disregard for truthfulness can be observed in all the intellectuals under discussion.
Hypocrisy, selfishness and vicious behaviour towards other people is another common thread, most spectacular in the cases of Shelley, Hemingway and Norman Mailer but present in all to some extent. The intellectual seems to be a person unable to progress beyond adolescence, which explains not only their childish behaviours but also their willingness to embrace remarkable silly ideas Marx and Tolstoy being classic examples Some Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir are so sad and pathetic one almost feels sorry for them while others Shelley, Lillian Hellman and Brecht are truly repellant.
There really is nothing more dangerous than an intellectual with a plan to remake the world. It's trial by smearing, eighties style. It's all a rather loathsome business, but Johnson, despite clearly having axes to grind with these roseate bedfellows, has churned the milk of scandal into a deliciously entertaining butter.
He's a fantastic writer - his History of the American People , though again marred by the rigor of his dogmatic filter slavery gently deplored but explainable, the New Deal a diabolic scheme to enslave , is an exercise in sheer reading pleasure - and well able to maximize both the outrage and the amusement quotient in the dross engendered from such larger-than-life personalities. Quite titillating by any measure, but a little does go a long way. View all 3 comments. Feb 01, Jan rated it it was ok Shelves: biographical , 20th-century-late.
A disappointing book. Very condescending and even disdainful with little effort at balance by ignoring their many positive contributions. Johnson examines the sex lives and the hygiene habits of a select group of people, relying almost entirely on secondary sources — that is, what others have said about them. Much of this, even if true, dirt under finger nails, etc. But what should we have expected?
Johnson was then forced to admit the affair. More recently, as a strong Catholic, in an interview he questioned the veracity of complaints about pedophilic priests. And where does Johnson lead us in his book?
He concludes that we must look at the moral credentials of intellectuals before accepting any advice on how to lead our lives. How much of their insights may come from their own life experience? Or should we listen to Lawrence when he said trust the tale, not the teller? In fairness and in an effort to have balance, Mr. Johnson is a learned man, a journalist who writes well. Before he was a conservative, he was a liberal and wrote for the New Statesman.
Wherever he wrote, he appeared to have had an active filter to interpret what he saw in the world to agree with his strongly held positions. Other writers may have struggled harder to be objective. Paul Hollander, in a review of Intellectuals by Paul Johnson defines "intellectual" as a western concept connoting "preoccupation with and respect for ideas but not for ideas as sacred doctrines. In Intellectuals, Johnson denounces the replacement of the cleric by the intellectual.
According to Johnson, the cleric played the role of intellectual prior to the decline of religious institutions in the 18th century. He contends this is a "dangerous" trend. In his book he attempts to display the vast gulf between progressive ideas and personal morality. His selection of intellectuals for study is peculiar. Hemingway, for one, may have been a genius, but he certainly was not an intellectual of the caliber of Rousseau or Marx or Tolstoy who are also included.
Nor are Hellman, or Chomsky or Gollancz. Johnson obviously suffers from the delusion that those who dispense moral advice need to follow their own prescriptions. Since when have clerics been any more upright than others? I would also argue that there are many religiously trained intellectuals writing today.
Johnson's selections seem to have been chosen more for their apparent antagonism to capitalistic society. While eminently readable, if you like gossip, Johnson spends little time on the philosophies of his victims, emphasizing instead their apparent lack of personal morality at least morality that Johnson supports. Johnson's flaw is attributing too much power to intellectuals. For example, he writes of Rousseau's distrust of capitalism and private property, declaims Rousseau's enormous influence on society, and then warns us of his dangerous thinking.
Oh really? I haven't noticed any great decline in our desire for accumulating wealth or property. Even the National Review decided this book was too gossipy and replete with overblown generalizations. But a little slander is fun too. Oct 17, Frieda Vizel rated it it was ok. I read every word of this juicy book even though I lost trust in the author very early on.
The book reads like a delicious tabloid writeup of the venerated thinkers; sex, drugs, drinking, mental illness, theft, fighting and a plethora of other personal scandal depicted with questionable reliability. If nothing else, this book feeds our personal cravings for schadenfreude. Johnson loses his credibility when the faults he finds in these thinkers - which at times seem quite human and expected - are I read every word of this juicy book even though I lost trust in the author very early on.
Johnson loses his credibility when the faults he finds in these thinkers - which at times seem quite human and expected - are depicted with extreme words like "preposterous, ridiculous, gruesome, promiscuous, dreadful, pathetic" and on the basis of small excerpts from their writings or a single sexual episode.
He hardly tells you why these individuals are so prominent in our history, except if you believe him, by virtue of their exploitative, hypersexual, corrupt and immoral nature.
If you never read the works of these Intellectuals or read a more balanced biography you may quickly be left to wonder why these intellectuals ever achieved acclaim. The positive accomplishments of the intellectuals are hardly expanded on.
Johnson explains this approach with his theory that the icon's personal life is key to understanding the public life, and there is no doubt that this is truth to his philosophy. But from that premise Johnson zooms in almost exclusively on the personal life, dishing about wives, ex-wives, mistresses, sexual exploits, fetishes, in two instances the intellectual's "obsession" with his penis.
While all of these would be fascinating and an indulgent read, Johnson comes off so disingenuous that at times he seems more preposterous than the intellectual he's trying to paint as such. Every good thing that is said or done by the intellectual is hyper-analyzed to discover the evil underpinnings, while every bad thing often related by ex wives are taken at face value, no analysis needed. What is most troubling about this book is that it pretends to be a book about individuals.
In reality, this is a book about the general Intellectual archetype as defined by Johnson: the secular leader and reformer who is the equivalent of the religious leader priest, rabbi, imam etc but without the religious element.
Johnson's aim was not to compile a number of biographies, but to prove an overarching theme: that "intellectuals", meaning, secular moral leaders, are not trustworthy. If I had understood this thesis before I read the book perhaps I wouldn't have been so astounded by Johnson's constant tearing down of intellectual after intellectual.
But the title doesn't give that away, and the book jumps right in the Rousseau and from there to Freud, Marx, Tolstoy and so on, criticizing them all in turn. In all, it was a fun read but one I would not take very seriously. View 2 comments. Apr 20, Brian Goldstein rated it it was amazing. Magnificent, all the emeperors without clothes, about time these rascals were exposed for the frauds they were! Jun 06, Realini rated it it was amazing.
Intellectuals by Paul Johnson This is an excellent book. It is upsetting and it might affect the reader, so a cautionary or warning sign might be in order on the cover somewhere. Like the adult or Paternal Guidance ratings for some films, one such sign would be advisable. And why is that? After you read this book, you will not feel the same about Tolstoy, Hemingway, Shelley…a young adult might feel inclined to avoid their books altogether.
Again; this is a great book, even if it has over four hundred Intellectuals by Paul Johnson This is an excellent book. Again; this is a great book, even if it has over four hundred pages, I have read all of it, with the exception of the chapters on Marx and Sartre. I hate Marxists anyway, so what would be the point of learning what loathing characters these two had. In fact, because the book is so good and paints such an accurate picture of these intellectuals, I leafed through the pages on Marx and Sartre.
And I had the confirmation that these two were devious and monsters.
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