- Paperback: 192 pages
- Publisher: Princeton University Press; New edition edition (Feb 12 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0691086621
- ISBN-13: 978-0691086620
- Product Dimensions: 23.4 x 15.5 x 1.4 cm
- Shipping Weight: 295 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #250,760 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Description
From Amazon
In these lectures, originally delivered at Washington, D.C.'s National Gallery of Art in 1965, acclaimed historian of philosophy Isaiah Berlin addresses the origins of what he deems "the greatest single shift in the consciousness of the West that has occurred." His focus, apart from some digressions into Montesquieu, Hume, and Rousseau, is on the German philosophers of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, and he runs through the contributions of Herder, Kant, Schiller, Fichte, Schlegel, and others in turn. He also shows how romanticism would later influence both the existentialists and the fascists, but paradoxically have its greatest influence upon the emergence of a liberalism that seems at complete odds with the romantic sensibility. Berlin's tone is informed but rarely obtuse, making The Roots of Romanticism as fun to read as it must have been to hear him deliver spoken. --Ron Hogan
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
In this posthumous volume, the British philosopher and historian of ideas quickly establishes his theory that GermanyAnot England or FranceAwas the birthplace of the romantic movement. A sense of provincial insignificance and ressentiment against the sophistication, prestige and military power of the French underwrote the movement's birth, he contends. Still, the territory covered by "Romanticism" seems so vast as to be contradictory, containing both "primitivism" and "dandyism," the worship both of the noble savage's simplicity and of "red waistcoats, blue hair, green wigs, absinthe, death, [and] suicide." While others have, understandably, thrown up their hands at the idea of uniting such disparate enthusiasms, Berlin sees contradiction itself as central to romanticism's legacy. Before romanticism, he argues, people believed that for any question there should be only one right answer, however difficult to discern. To a romantic, all beliefs, however incompatible, can be admired if they are held with real convictionAa notion from which both relativism and pluralism (like Berlin's own) are born. Further, the romantics sought to free the human will from all constraints: "the attempt to blow up and explode the very notion of a stable structure of anything," he asserts, is "the deepest and in a sense the most insane [element] in this extremely valuable and important movement." As if in illustration of the romantics' own principle, Berlin, despite his belief that the movement's ideals ultimately become dangerous, nonetheless gets inside the minds of the thinkers he analyzesAHerder, Kant, SchillerAand presents their ideas persuasively. Written for a lecture series in the early '60s and not originally intended as a book (Hardy is to be commended for a masterful editing job), Berlin's work here transcends these limits. It is thoroughly brilliant, often thrilling and yet always accessible.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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First Sentence
I MIGHT be expected to begin, or to attempt to begin, with some kind of definition of romanticism, or at least some generalisation, in order to make clear what it is that I mean by it. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
I MIGHT be expected to begin, or to attempt to begin, with some kind of definition of romanticism, or at least some generalisation, in order to make clear what it is that I mean by it. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars
I've Had better,
By
This review is from: The Roots of Romanticism (Paperback)
Isaiah Berlin is a good scholar and a colorful writer. However, his book The Roots of Romanticism, I did not find helpful. I suppose maybe if one approached this book with no prior knowledge of romanticism, maybe than it might provide some useful information. But if one is looking for further insight this is not the book.My main critique with this book is its lack of conciseness. Beginning with the first two sentences the author makes this quite clear: "I might be expected to begin, or attempts to begin, with some kind of definition of romanticism, or at least some generalisation, in order to make clear what it is that I mean by it. I do not propose to walk into that particular trap." (p. 1) No, instead Mr. Berlin walks into the trap of ambiguity. I understand that this book was originally a series of lectures, however, to say that one will not commit himself to particular meaning is absurd because, if 'truly' practiced this is a nonsense word. Maybe Mr. Berlin is purporting ambiguity as the 'definition' and in that case the introduction becomes ironical. In either case this book is filled with many more cases of such ambiguity. For example, in the rest of the chapter Mr. Berlin gives out a hodgepodge of 'everybody' else's definition and then commits himself to none.(This might have been a great lecturing device, but it is burdensome to the reader.) However, in practice Mr. Berlin attaches himself to the meaning of Romanticism as a historical movement: "I shall do my best to explain what in my view the romantic movement fundamentally came to. The only an sane and sensible way of approaching it, at least the only way that I have ever found to be at all helpful, is by slow and patients historical method." (p. 20) The one thing that I did find interesting in this book was the comments on Hamaan the critic of Kant. As a historical figure Hamaan is virtually forgotten in most discussions on philosophy or romanticism. These comments on Hamaan are better discussed in Mr. Berlin's book Three Critics of the Enlightenment. (I would recommend this to the reader). Also, for more recent scholarship on the interaction of Kant and Hamaan see Kuen's biography on Kant. For a better picture of Romanticism I would recommend Kierkegaard's book Either/Or.
5.0 out of 5 stars
An amazing book.,
By P. Lopez "Futurologist" (Monterrey, Mexico) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Roots of Romanticism (Hardcover)
Amazing, powerful detective work of the roots, the meaning and the aftereffects of Romanticism. Berlin uses a very nice plain "writing" style which can be easily comprehended, and yet it is beautiful enough and complex enough to give you great insights into one of the most tremendous movements in man's history. A great introductory work for the novice. This is how philosophical equiry should be like.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Magnificent,
This review is from: The Roots of Romanticism (Hardcover)
This is a brilliant series of lectures by one of the most outstanding humanist scholars of the twentieth century. His style is simple yet elegant, his expositions of even the most obscure thinkers are lucid and crisp. This really is a wonderful and important book.Berlin sees Romanticism as a reaction to the universalism and exaggerated rationalism of the Enlightenment. He sees Montesquieu's relativism and Hume's skepticism as early assaults on this dominant frame of mind, but for the most part Romanticism is the creation of German thinkers. The link to German resentment against French pomp and superficiality is well known. The connection with the spirituality of German pietism, on the other hand, is largely ignored in other works on the subject, but convincingly argued in this book. Berlin gives clear and comprehensible accounts of the sources of Romanticism in the writings of Hamann, Herder, Schiller, Kant(!), Fichte, and Schelling. Especially the thought of the unknown Hamann and the aesthetics of Schiller struck me as fascinating, partly because of Berlin's gracious, flowing style which is both description, quotation and explanation at the same time. The author is also able to mix epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics in a holistic fashion, an accomplishment the Romantics would surely laud. If I have to make one complaint, and it is perhaps not even that relevant, it might be that Berlin ignores Fichte's 'principle of right', which determines the limit of my individual freedom by the effects my free actions have on the freedom of other people. This is interesting because Berlin in his concluding remarks describes the "surprising" result that Romanticism, because of its insistence on both free will and the incompatibility of values, becomes a forceful defense for liberal pluralism and tolerance. In my opinion, this is not such a great surprise: if we scrutinize the ethics of the early Fichte, we will see that this connection is present even in the gestation of the Romantic movement.
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