Review by Booklist Review
Like his New Criterion colleague Hilton Kramer, Kimball writes forcefully and fluently about the intellectual currents that affect the arts. Like Kramer, he upholds high modernism, as epitomized by the moral seriousness of T. S. Eliot, subject of the warmest piece in this book. Like Kramer's Twilight of the Intellectuals (1999), this book contains originally freestanding essays that share a common theme. Whereas the theme of Kramer's Twilight was American liberal intellectuals' obstinate tolerance of Communism, Kimball's collection is concerned with various forms of the denial of reality in modern literature and philosophy. Because his subjects are greater artists and intellects than most of Kramer's in Twilight, Kimball's is a more engaging book. Kimball is as keenly gratifying as he is because, though he rues the intellectual and spiritual mistakes of such figures as J. S. Mill and Nietzsche, he grants their personal weaknesses and literary strengths. Even when his subjects have very few redeeming characteristics--Sartre, or Foucault, for instance--Kimball doesn't demonize them as he demolishes their vicious ideas. Superb intellectual journalism. --Ray Olson
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
