The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell by Nicholas Griffin (9780415249980)

Description - The Selected Letters of Bertrand Russell by Nicholas Griffin

'All goes well with me - everybody treats me kindly, from the Governor downwards. I hope soon to have writing materials: then I shall write first a book called Introduction to Modern Logic , and when that is finished I shall start an ambitious work to be called Analysis of Mind . Conditions here are good for philosophy.' So wrote Bertrand Russell to his brother Frank from Brixton prison in 1918. Russell was imprisoned for six months for writing leaflets about pacifism. It is one incident in the remarkable life of one of the greatest intellectual figures of the twentieth century. This second of two volumes of Russell's letters covers most of Russell's adult life, the period during which he wrote over thirty books including his famous History of Western Philosophy. Alongside Russell's Autobiography , these letters present the most accurate and enthralling account of his life yet published. They contain letters to some of the greatest figures of the twentieth century, including Ho Chi Minh, Lyndon Johnson, Tito, Jawaharlal Nehru and Jean-Paul Sartre.
The letters, only three of which have been published before, present a brilliant picture of a philosophical genius, an impassioned campaigner for peace and social reform, and a man torn between a longing for closeness to those he loved and an intense fear of possessiveness which he saw as his own 'fundamental vice'. The letters also reveal the astonishing range of Russell's correspondence. The anguish of his personal life comes through powerfully in is letters to Ottoline Morrell and Colette O'Neil. Other sides of Russell, from his thoughts on science to education, are revealed in his letters to Niels Bohr, Rebecca West and John Dewey. We learn of his troubled friendship with D. H. Lawrence and T.S. Eliot, and there are letters about his founding of Beacon Hill School and his thoughts on the Russian Revolution. In his nineties, Russell was regularly dictating more than twelve letters a day. He was a tireless and engaging correspondent, and these letters, selected and fully annotated by Nicholas Griffin, give a vivid picture of his life and activities.

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