Leszek Kołakowski: Modernity on Endless Trial

University of Chicago Press, 1997 (1990)     Amazon.com

Back Cover:

Leszek Kolakowski delves into some of the most intellectually vigorous questions of our time in this remarkable collection of essays garnished with his characteristic wit. His writings cover nature and the limits of modernity, Christianity in the modern world, politics and ideology, and the question of the claim to knowledge of the human science. Taken together, these essays represent an overview of the problems and dilemmas facing modern reason and modern man.

“Exemplary…It should be celebrated.”  Arthur C. Danto, New York Times Book Review

“This book…express[es] Kolakowski’s thought on God, man, reason, history, moral truth and original sin, prompted by observation of the dramatic struggle among Christianity, the Enlightenment and modern totalitarianism. It is a wonderful collection of topics.”  Thomas Nagel, Times Literary Supplement

“No better antidote to bumper-sticker thinking exists than this collection of 24 ‘appeals for moderation in consistency,’ and never has such an antidote been needed more than it is now.”  Joseph Coates, Chicago Tribune

“Whether learned or humorous, these essays offer gems in prose of diamond hardness, precision, and brilliance.”  Thomas D’Evelyn, The Christian Science Monitor

A “Notable Books of the Year 1991” selection, New York Times Book Review; a “Noted with Pleasure” selection, New York Times Book Review; a “Summer Reading 1991” selection, New York Times Book Review; a “Books of the Year” selection, The Times.

About the Author:

Wikipedia

JOB’s Comment:

Some strange formulations on the back cover, of a kind that one doesn’t expect from Chicago. The human science? And doesn’t “vigorous questions” refer rather to the manner in which questions are asked – in this case, the way Kołakowski delves into them – than the questions themselves? But be that as it may. Kołakowski was a vastly influential Polish philosopher, not least in the late 1970s and the 1980s due to his magisterial Main Currents of Marxism in three volumes. But having moved beyond Marxism with that criticism, his later work is even more interesting and important.