No comments about The Making Of A Christian Psychiatrist.

No comments about In a Days Work: Four Child Welfare Workers in California.

5 comments about Friedrich Hayek: A Biography.

1. Until nearly the end of the 20th century, Friedrich Hayek seemed to be destined to be ignored and to remain in the backdrop of economic, political and philosophical history. Keynesian economics ruled, with its reliance upon state control of the levers of the economy. Hayek's vision of a renewed classical liberalism with free markets and individualism cut against the conventional intellectual wisdom of his day. Despite that, Hayek was convinced that total systems such as socialism or communism would lead to tyranny. Hayek argued that the Keynesian viewpoint, because of its reliance upon state controls, was destined to limit individual's liberty.
   
   Hayek believed that there was an inevitable conflict between socialism and freedom. He argued passionately, and at times he was a solitary voice, for freedom and liberty. Today with the collapse of communism and the resurgence of free markets across the globe, Hayek's ideas have gained new prominence. Hayek's intellectual contributions to our world in terms of political science, philosophy, and economics can not be underestimated.
   
   The author, Alan Ebenstein, holds a Ph.D. in economics. His account of Hayek's life is illuminating, not covering just his economic and philosophical contributions. Ebenstein covers Hayek's life from the early years and his flirtations with Fabianism (the advancement of socialist ideas through gradual means and through the insertion of its ideas into intellectual circles of influence) through to his legacy as a visionary thinker. Ebenstein's biography of Hayek's life appears to be fair and balanced on the whole. Since the author is a trained economist, you can see the benefit of his background throughout the biography without the dulling effects many associate with the dismal science. If you want to learn more about Hayek the man and his ideas, this is an ideal and recommended book.



2. This biography has many short chapters, and displays a considerable balance. The structure of the book reflects the nature of Hayek's thoughts. "Hayek put forward the difficult idea of spontaneous order. In a spontaneous order, individuals may exchange and interact with one another as they desire. There is no central management of individual decision making." (p. 3). The fame of Friedrich Hayek is associated mainly with the political views needed to maintain a thriving economy as much as with the idea that no one person knows everything that is going on in an economy which functions as Adam Smith pictured, with each person acting in his own interest in order to produce the mix of goods and services that best provides the needs of all. Adam Smith is listed in the index, but not quite as much as Milton Friedman, who is occasionally mentioned as being more popular than Hayek, as well as more correct in the analysis of monetary policy in the United States at the start of the great depression.

   Hayek finished a law degree and a second degree in political science from the University of Vienna before he lived in the United States from March 1923 to May 1924. (p. 31). One of his first economic articles in 1924 was "on American monetary policy suggesting that an expansionist credit policy leads to an overdevelopment of capital goods industries and ultimately to a crisis. . . . So I put in that article a long footnote sketching an outline of what ultimately became my explanation of industrial fluctuations. . . . A rate of interest which is inappropriately low offers to the individual sectors of the economy an advantage which is greater the more remote is their product from the consumption stage." (p. 41). The Federal Reserve Bank had been designed to keep the economy moving by offering great deals to capitalists, but when Hayek noted the tendency to produce instability, he became the head "of the evolution of Austrian business cycle theory." (p. 41). When the depression became the lowest point reached by the American economy in the 20th century, Hayek continued to think that low interest rates in the 1920s had produced the instability which produced it, while Milton Friedman produced a monetary explanation which is more widely accepted.

   Public opinion is often a matter of simplifications which avoid the complexity that real problems present. Chapter 8, on Keynes, quotes Keynes attacking Marxism as if Marxism were nothing but a public opinion. "How can I adopt a creed which, preferring the mud to the fish, exalts the boorish proletariat above the bourgeois and intelligentsia who, with whatever faults, are the quality of life and surely carry the seeds of all human advancement?" (p. 68). German was a problem for Keynes, who wrote "in German I can only understand what I know already!" (p. 70). Hayek tried to review Keynes' TREATISE ON MONEY for an English journal, "Economica," when he was about to start teaching at the London School of Economics. Keynes seemed to think that his criticism could be characterized as "The wild duck has dived down to the bottom--as deep as she can get--and bitten fast hold of the weed and tangle and all the rubbish that is down there, and it would need an extraordinarily clever dog to dive after and fish her up again." (pp. 357-358). Hayek was allowed to publish a reply in the "Economic Journal" edited by Keynes "to an article by Piero Sraffa attacking him, and concluded his reply, `I venture to believe that Mr. Keynes would fully agree with me in ... that he [Sraffa] has understood Mr. Keynes' theory even less than he has my own.' Keynes then footnoted, `I should like to say that, to the best of my comprehension, Mr. Sraffa has understood my theory accurately.' " (p. 72). The finishing touches on this argument are complex. Keynes wrote that his footnote was appended to Hayek's reply "with Prof. Hayek's permission," (p. 72), a sure sign that Keynes was amused at agreeing far more with Sraffa, however Hayek might feel about it, and that he had done everything he could to force Hayek to see it his way.

   Hayek was admired most for his popular book, THE ROAD TO SERFDOM, which considered central planning in control of an economy as a major step on the way to totalitarianism. He expected his book, THE CONSTITUTION OF LIBERTY, to appeal to the same readers, but when it was published on February 9, 1960, people had other concerns. In "The New York Times Book Review," Sydney Hook presented the mainstream economic opposition to Hayek's major concerns. "He is an intellectual tonic. But in our present time of troubles, his economic philosophy points the road to disaster." (p. 203).

   Considering disasters in the area of economics, it is difficult to counter the idea that any government program offers the kind of deviation from stability that anyone would expect from a drunken bat. One idea that was almost popular at the end of the 20th century was a lockbox, where workers' money could be kept until it was time for them to retire. Hayek followed John Locke in thinking that civil government can maintain an impartial liberty through "certain basic rules on everybody." (p. 224). LAW, LEGISLATION AND LIBERTY was supposed to provide some guidelines, but there was no lockbox in the title, or in the title of any of Hayek's books. Now tax law has changed, as a basic incentive for a rise in the price of common stock, without safeguards to see that income is taxed even once. Speculation seems to be the common assumption upon which everyone is now to be satisfied. Actually, I suppose the government might never stop flying around like a drunken bat. For all the complexity in this book, it is much less like a drunken bat than the opinions I find in any newspaper.




3. Hayek's life deserves-no demands- a biography of the highest order. I read Hayek in my studies in college and I was fascinated by his theories. He was a man who thought and wrote on profound economic issues.
   This biography, while seemingly well researched, does a disservice to the man. I (and a book club for an ivy league college) found it poorly written and structured. Sentences, paragraphs and thoughts collide.
   I would only recommend this book to diehard Hayek groupies (though it may cause pain). Individuals who want to learn more about him might benefit from skimming through the book. However, I would caution those individuals who seek out intelligent biographies of interesting people-that despite Hayek's very interesting life, this is not an intelligent biography worthy of him.



4. Ebenstein's biography of Hayek is well received, as the other reviews testify. It's informative, readable, and generally fair-minded. Nevertheless I feel that the merits of this book do not deserve such high praise as was given, even by such outstanding men as Friedman. Ebenstein's understanding of Hayek's ideas is narrow and derivative, his portrayal of the man is flat. Above all, the most fundamental aspect of Hayek's thought, namely his elucidation of a complex spontaneous order (independent of the properties of the elements), is neglected. Ebenstein also completely misunderstood Hayek's criticism of Mill, which is characterized as unfair in this book. This is no minor misunderstanding, as what's at stake is Hayek's attack on the concept of social justice, again one of the most important parts of his political philosophy. Reading this book, one gets the impression that Ebenstein is a hard-working, sincere, and intelligent fellow. But as the author of the first substantial biography of Hayek, he simply does not possess enough learning or insight to carry out this task adequately.



5. This biography is one of those that once you start reading, you can't put it down! This long-overdue biography on Hayek is more of a commentary upon his major works and thoughts, interwoven with the major movements within his life.Most personal reflections of the man himself come from people who, in most cases, only knew him briefly or in limited circumstances, which is one of the major weaknesses of the work. However, the insights into the man are, at times, critical and help to remind us that the great man was human! Yet, one is left with the feeling that there is much more to be revealed, not so much about his weaknesses, but his undoubted greatness! This book is a MUST for every lover of Hayek. But there is room, in the future, for a further biography, written in the same strain as Skidelsky's excellent work on Keynes

1 comments about The Correspondence of William James: William and Henry, 1897-1910 (Correspondence of William James).

1. Although this is the fourth volume of the new edition of WJ's correspondence, in a way it is really the first, and would be a good place for a reader desiring a more intimate acquaintance with William James and his world to start. Volumes 1-3 were devoted to the letters to and from his equally famous novelist brother -- an appealing idea and one probably calculated to increase interest and sales, but perhaps questionable on more fundamental grounds. Be that as it may, as a reading experience Volume 4 can scarcely be recommended too highly. William James is probably one of the most lovable letter writers ever to set pen to paper. In these letters every sentence comes alive and breathes.

   James possessed to a high degree qualities of attention, powers of observation, and an adorable desire to render experience vividly. It is a cliche to say that "a world comes alive" in pages like these, but that is the feeling I have when, for example, I read a letter written from Dresden to Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. on May 15, 1868: "Wendell of my entrails! At the momentous point where the last sheet ends I was interrupted by the buxom maid calling me to tea and through various causes have not got back till now. As I sit by the open window waiting for my bkfst. and look out on the line of Droschkies drawn up on the side of the dohna Platz, and see the coachmen, red faced, red collared, & blue coated with varnished hats, sitting in a variety of indolent attitudes upon their boxes, one of them looking in upon me and probably wondering what the devil I am, When I see the big sky with a monstrous white cloud battening and bulging up from behind the houses into the blue, with a uniform coppery film drawn over cloud & blue which makes one anticipate a soaking day, when I see the houses opposite with their balconies & windows filled with flowers & greenery -- ha! on the topmost balcony of one stands a maiden, black jaketted, red petticoated, fair and slim under the striped awning leaning her elbow on the rail and her peach like chin upon her rosy finger tips -- Of whom thinkest thou, maiden, up there aloft? here, *here!* beats that human heart for wh. in the drunkenness of the morning hour thy being vaguely longs, & tremulously, but recklessly and wickedly posits elsewhere, over those distant housetops which thou regardest..."

   This jocular yet earnest mood is perhaps the most pervasive one in these letters. Yet we also get glimpses into the deep and suicidal depressions he fought during his early years. Several of the letters in this volume blossom into fascinating six- or seven-page ruminations on some of the deepest questions of philosophy and religion, for these are the years in which James, "swamped in an empirical philosophy," won through to a view of the world that found room for consciousness, will, and spirit. It is in his letters to (and from) Holmes, the physician Henry Bowditch, and his bosom friend Tom Ward that we feel most intensely James's mind and heart grappling with the ideas he cares most deeply about.

   But James is not always mulling over deep principles. At eighteen years of age he briefly considered becoming a painter, and began studies to that end, so it is in his character to be fully alive to surface details of the scene about him. A commentary on cultural and political matters full of interesting judgments runs though these letters. Readers will also come to feel they know well every member of the James family. WJ's letters to his sister Alice are especially remarkable.

   Though my initial reaction to the policy of extremely restrained annotation practiced by the editorial team was one of frustration, in the end I came to appreciate the free hand it gives us to reread letters more carefully and to feel ourselves into the wonderful and mysterious crannies of the inner life of a great human being. To this end, I recommend deferring the introduction by Giles Gunn until after they have concluded the letters. Professor Gunn (of UC Santa Barbara) has interesting and pertinent things to say -- especially about James's relation to his father, the Swedenborgian theologian Henry James, Sr., on whose work Gunn has written -- but there is nothing there that cannot wait until readers have first immersed themselves in the primary texts.

   The volumes of this series are beautiful in their craftsmanship, and it is an aesthetic as well as intellectual delight to manipulate and peruse them. This volume would make an excellent gift for a bright high school senior or college freshman, since the problems of youth and of finding a vocation hold a special place here -- for anyone struggling with a chronic or debilitating illness (James is plagued with back and eye problems through most of these years) -- or indeed, for anyone who reads!

4 comments about Goodbye Jumbo...Hello Cruel World.

1. Louie Anderson continues to battle the demons of his dysfunctional upbringing in this second of his three books. In his first book, Dear Dad, Louie focused on his abusive father's alcoholism and the impact it has had on the comedian's life and overall psychological well being. In this book, he tries to come to grips with his own obesity and the negative impact it has had on his life. He largely attributes it to his father's alcoholism and the lack of love he received as a child. Anderson's reflections are often laugh out loud funny. Yet, throughout the book, there is an overall sense of pain. As somebody who grew up battling obesity (I eventually lost 150 lbs), I can understand the psychological abuse that fat people receive on a daily basis. They are insulted, ridiculed, and treated like outcasts. This leaves the victim feeling angry, bitter, and very lonely. He or she turns to food to ease the pain, which only makes the problem worse. For anybody who has battled obesity, this book will be very therapeutic. If you've never had a weight problem, this book will no doubt give you more compassion for those who have. The 250 page book is an easy, quick read and is very inspiring.



2. Louie Anderson once again brings the struggles of his life to print, and opens up his heart and soul. I found this book even better than his first. I hope he decides to keep writing, he is very talented at bringing the reader into his situation.



3. Funny and poignant, from Anderson's heart and stomach are a guide to life, coping, eating, love, comedy, and performing. Also manages to be downright hilarious with straight-ahead stand-up comedy. Somehow it all works. And very nicely, too. Inspired and inspiring.



4. Louie Anderson does a wonderful job of revealing the true self. Especially the dialogue where he becomes Jumbo the elephant. He never mentioned a Love interest (human, not food) who could be support he so needed during these transitions he struggled with, the treadmill, death of his mom, selling the home, etc. Louie remains a real human, down to earth, complete with dysfunctional family. It was difficult to see him as the superstar wealthy comedian image we see. Whether it is food or some other controlling addiction, low self-esteem, children of alcoholics, pained school years, many can relate to his struggle. A good book by a funny man!

5 comments about The Magic Daughter: A Memoir of Living with Multiple Personality Disorder.

1. While this book is a refresher from the cliches about Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), formerly Multiple Personality Disorder that "Sybil" and "The Three Faces of Eve" created, I was still sorely disappointed in this book. One thing that bothers me that there are people who view DID as an exotic condition and who go to great lengths to try to convince others they are hosts to other personalities. Instead of being exotic, it is a devastating condition that has cost people their jobs, families and in some cases their lives. Cases have been reported where one personality was out to kill another and as a result, the "host" or "core" personality was the casualty.
   
   The author, who is identified as "Jane Phillips" started this book as a suicide note. A survivor of fraternal incest and neglectful parents, she makes her way through therapists and treatments until one therapist, with whom she has established rapport finally realizes through researching DID that she does indeed have this condition.
   
   To this book's credit, Phillips is nothing like the stereotypes that currently exist about DID. She does not have any extraordinary artistic ability that "surfaces" in other personalities; she is a college professor; she is somehow able to keep herselves in check while at work. Embarrassing moments do crop up, such as when she has no recollection of someone her alters have met.
   
   One part that I really loved was when Jane went toy shopping at the behest of her child alters. They implored her not to buy "some dumb bear with a dumb expression on his face" and "no dumb bears, ever!" As one who also dislikes bears, that made me smile.
   
   Sexual abuse is often the taproot of DID. Jane was raped by her older brother; when she was in college, she became involved with a violent man named "Jack" who raped her when she insisted that he move out.
   
   Like the famous (or infamous) Sybil before her, Jane had "fugue" states that she dated back to middle school. She finally, at age 30 enlists therapy after suffering from migraines and panic attacks.
   
   Her childhood was paradoxical. On the one hand, she was cherished as she was the only daughter and girls were a rarity in her family. On the other hand, she was penalized for her feminity. Jane's mother bought her a doll one Christmas that Jane didn't want and insisted she play with it; whenever Jane left it alone for long intervals, her mother would hound her to play with it, all the while telling her how lucky she was to have such a thing.
   
   Jane's growing feminity was measured and recorded by her mother; her breasts, hips and cycles were duly noted and she was not given any privacy regarding these very intimate matters. When Jane makes decisions for herself, such as going into therapy in adulthood, her parents systematically and symbolically cut her out of their lives by having pictures of her removed. Her mother makes irrational comments such as Jane's silver baby cup "is none of her business." That sounded completely illogical.
   
   I didn't like this book and felt it "glided" through some of the more harrowing aspects of DID. This book is like bare bones compared to many other excellent, well-rounded works on this subject. I recommend "First Person Plural," "Katherine It's Time," "Shatter," and all the books Chris Sizemore, aka Eve has written about her own experiences with DID.



2. Most of us think of Multiple Personality Disorder in terms of 'Sybil,' or 'The Three Faces of Eve,' or that California serial killer who claimed the rest of him was innocent. To us, it's an exotic craziness that either doesn't exist or is sensationally unpredictable and dangerous.

   Phillips, pseudonymous author of 'The Magic Daughter,' not only makes the disorder (now called Dissociative Identity Disorder) credible, she puts one scared and human face on it. Phillips' memoir began in April 1993 as a suicide note. But in trying to explain why life was too difficult to bear, she became absorbed in the project and it eventually became a means of integrating her "selves."

   Phillips fits none of the stereotypes. She's a college professor whose students and colleagues are unaware of her disorder. She was considered thorough - because several selves would independently do her work, each needing to ensure it was done correctly - unbeknownst to Jane herself. She learned to cover when greeted by people she didn't remember. Nothing was more relaxing than hours spent gazing into the mirror, communing with a parade of faces, young, old, boyish, feminine, wise and foolish - none of which seemed to be hers. But just getting through a normal day could be exhausting as she fought to control conflicting emotions and maintain a moment to moment chronology.

   Since junior high she had been secretly aware of something wrong. "Mostly I just never seemed to be who I really was - although I had no idea who that was." All through college, through marriage to an alcoholic, she thought of seeing a psychiatrist but all she could think to ask was "What's wrong with me? Why is life so hard?"

   At 30, she finally sought help after a summer tormented by headaches, profound depression and uncontrollable bouts of terror and anger during which she tore out all the flowers in her beloved garden, carried a gasoline can to the house intending to burn the place down and spent hours in her closet crying because none of the clothes seemed to belong to her. But she was still, despite the psychologist's prodding, unable to express what she wanted out of therapy.

   Probing her childhood, the therapist precipitated a wrench back in time. "Suddenly, weirdly, I was nine years old again." Out came memories - the anger and violence of her older brother, Hank, who had tormented his younger siblings. And attempted to rape his sister Jane, failing only because their parents arrived home unexpectedly. "I couldn't tell if I had remembered it or made it up."

   Her brother's attacks and elaborate malice - much of it sexual - continued throughout her childhood. But there was another side to her home life. On both sides her family was overrun with boys. She was the girl all the adults had been waiting for. She was petted and loved and expected to rectify all the deficiencies of her mother's childhood. Failure to measure up was met with anger and recriminations. It was a turbulent, tormented childhood, but many children suffer worse horrors.

   Multiplicity, says Phillips, has three main causes. The first is a predisposing brain chemistry, second is trauma and third is a lack of recognition or acceptance of that trauma by adults.

   While she was recognized as dissociative early on, she was not diagnosed as a multiple until five years into therapy. Her memoir brings home to the reader how thin the line is between normal emotional turmoil and a fragmented personality. Even some of her truly bizarre symptoms, such as an inability to distinguish between current and remembered pain, or to explain symptoms before another personality takes over and the symptoms disappear, arouse empathy.

   This passionate, harrowing journey towards self-understanding and, ultimately, integration, makes unusual demands on the reader. Perception is a solitary thing - Phillips believed for years that everyone had psyches like hers but other people were braver and smarter about life. It's not the fragments themselves that defy comprehension but the wholeness and separateness of them - the personalities that remain forever 5 or 15, personalities that know only fear or loneliness or anger. With this book, Phillips makes it possible to understand how she protected her core by snapping off bits of herself which then took on particular functions in daily life, setting up a cycle which made her days almost impossible to negotiate.




3. The Magic Daughter: A Memoir of Living With Multiple Personality Disorder, by Jane Phillips (pseudonym) is the first-person narrative of a woman who suffers multiple personality disorder -- more precisely dissociative identity disorder (DID) -- most of her life. Since the author does not have the typical chronological concept of time until, for the most part, the end of the narrative, the book is composed of snippets of recollections and experiences with each chapter encompassing a theme. Oddly, however, the book does nonetheless have a peculiar linear fabric to the recollections. Apparently, to some extent, the author also recognizes this toward the end of the book.

   My reading this book was not one of choice. I was assigned this topic in an Abnormal Psychology course two years ago. However, after finding this book, I was still reluctant upon reading it, expecting it to be dull. (My apologies to those suffering from DID who found support and enlightenment in this book.) Suprisingly I found the book very engaging, regardless of its non chronological sequence, and the author's quite fluid writing style.
   
   Nonetheless, on the negative side, most of the way thru it I found myself feeling doubtful. I began doubting either the authenticity of this work or the writer's sincerity. However, that feeling is probably groundless....

   The negative criticisms I have are that there are certainly some unanswered questions; for that matter unraised questions in the text. But, if this work is authentic, it very well may have been that the writer wrote this more for herself than for others.

   Secondly, it is interesting to note again that if Jane had MPD, her disorder was not nearly of the severity as other noteworthy cases I have read about including the case of Chris Sizemore upon whose experiences the book and movie The Three Faces of Eve were based. There are similarities between Chris Sizemore's experiences and Jane's, however, it is difficult to get beyond the sense that much of Jane's supposed MPD symptoms and experiences did not result after, and as a result of the diagnosis of MPD.

   Nevertheless, it was a very good read. Engaging, thought provoking.




4. Like only a handful of books written about multiplicity, this one was written by the multiple herself, rather than her therapist. However, unlike so many other multiple-written books, this one was actually decently composed. Which, after attempting such poorly-crafted tomes as I'm Eve and Prism, was an enthusiastically received change.

   The Magic Daughter also differs from other multiplicity books in one other, significant way. Though arranged in rough chronological order, this book is more a series of personal essays than an autobiography. While this is frustrating in one regard--in that not all "plot threads" are adequately resolved--it allows the writer to avoid rehashing less than interesting moments in her life and concentrate on the issues that she truly wants to handle.

   Although I know multiples who truly hated this book, I enjoyed it highly. On numerous occasions, I found myself reflected in its pages. I was easily able to identify with passages such as:

   "Life is hard! I want to shriek. My head aches, my mind roars with voices, I have no extra money, I'm exhausted, and I can barely think straight. I scream in the night, my body aches with remembered abuses, and therapy requires that I recall and then relive those old, horrifying traumas."

   Perhaps if she had focused on the happier moments of multiplicity, her story may have been more endearing to empowered multiples. To her, however, multiplicity is something that needs to be cured, though she does acknowledge it may have causes completely unrelated to abuse.

   "I suddenly felt unnerved. Her therapist was a man who'd made a substantial name for himself because of his work with abuse survivors; he often lectured and offered workshops. For some reason, I blurted out that I'd been multiple three, maybe four years before I was sexually abused." (Italics mine.)

   Sadly Phillips does not deal with natural multiplicity for more than a few paragraphs. Perhaps such an exploration would have been out of place in this book, which is focused more or the end of multiplicity than its beginnings. It does not end happily with integration, though. While Phillips does make inroads towards that goal in the final half of the book, she is only at the start of the process when the book ends, with much work still ahead of her.

   How she handles integration may make many multiples wary. She simply decides to stop dissociating, that she's had enough. It's not that cut and dried, but that is the brunt of it. And, as she is seen in this book very much as the core personality, she believes that she can simply stop, much as one can stop chewing their nails. Multiplicity is simply a more elaborate and debilitating habit.

   And that's where she'll lose a lot of multiples, especially those that truly love and care for their system mates. Still, whether or not I agree with her, I enjoyed reading about her opinions and struggles. The book was very well constructed and a fast read. With that in mind, I'd recommend it, though it may drive some empowered, non-trauma-based multiples crazy.




5. This book was hard for me to put down. I was so interested in finding out if Jane Phillips had come to any peace with her disorder, and how she went about doing that. The book focuses on the process of dealing with MPD, rather than the traumatic events which caused her to have MPD.

   I have a lot of compassion for people living with MPD after reading her book. I don't feel like I understand the disorder, but the book is filled with amazing insights.

   Thank you for being brave enough to publish such a personal experience.

No comments about The Lost Itinerary of Frank Hamilton Cushing (Southwest Center Series).

No comments about Einstein para principiantes.

No comments about Erik Erikson.

5 comments about Noam Chomsky: A Life of Dissent.

1. Obviously anybody with a triple-didget I.Q.
   can see by even a casual read that Chomsky
   is a complicated man. Thus many of his books
   are at least somewhat complicated reads. I
   highly recommend this as a potential 'Best
   of...' book for Anti-Statist fans who also
   like other controversial jewish authors books
   like Murray N. Rothbard (my favorite of the
   genre!), Art Koestler (The Thirteenth Tribe),
   et, al. Also check out Art R. Butz 'Hoax of
   the Twentieth Century', and Walt Sanning's
   Dissolution of Eastern European Jewry...



2. This biography doesn't have much to offer for those who are more or less familiar with Chomsky's work. On a side note, there isn't much to say about Chomsky's life beyond his work, which is obviously all-consuming. As such, the biographer is reduced to an amateurish overview of Chomsky's career and influences which are all together pretty dry and unsatisfying. It's much better to get an understanding of Chomsky's work from his own words, I highly recommend "Understanding Power, and "Language and Politics," for instance. Perhaps the only thing that kept me reading is the author's overview of Chomsky's political development as an activist and scholar. There are some excellent selections going into the various political literatures that helped shape Chomsky's ideology as a young person. Unfortunately, the biographer takes it upon himself to subjectively defend Chomsky in some of his more controversial endeavors. I'm referring now to the Robert Faurrison affair. The author should have simply let Chomsky's defense of the matter speak for itself but instead he chooses to attack an author who was critical of Chomsky by explaining an encounter he had in which he heard the author speak give a lecture on the topic in which he didn't seem to have a handling of the material which the biographer decides is proof that he didn't actually read his book. This is a task for another text and shouldn't have been included. An average read on the whole, though it may be useful as an overview for those who are new to Chomsky.



3. ...

   As for this biography, I suggest taking a copy out of a library and check it out before purchasing. It does cover some ground, and is an enjoyable read, if you're a fan.




4. For those who only know Chomsky for his revolutionary work in the field of linguistics and are not aware that he is also an untiring critic of media propaganda and government malfeasance this book is for you. In this enlightening biography of one of America's leading dissidents, Barsky beautifully illustrates Chomsky's dedication in his tireless fight against the forces of injustice and hate--at great personal risk to both his career and life. The ideal that Chomsky follows is not new, however, but based in the long tradition of social activism that finds its birth in the philosophy of Socrates, put to use by countless individuals from Thoreau, Ghandi and Martin Luther King, through their adherence to the fundamental idea of intellectual independence and a healthy skepticism of the dictates of power and authority.
   In a society so full of apologists for militarism, who substitute mindless justification for military operations in place of a critical, reasoned view of world events, Chomsky stands out for his courageous opposition to totalitarianism, wherever it is found. Apparently, this hiding place is alittle to close for some. Regardless of his critics, Chomsky is destined to go down in history as one of the most important thinkers of the 20th century--an exemplary example of what an intellectual should be.



5. Barsky's achievement is respectable for at least one reason: he got some personal information out of Chomsky. I've been reading Chomsky for a while now and have always been impressed by his guarding of his personal life. David Barsamian, who has interviewed him probably more than anyone has - for sure more than anyone I know has - comes close once in a while. Usually it touches on how he feels about something; never anything to do with the stuff to keep biographers buzzing. As for the rest of Barsky's book I have to say that I was hardly moved by it. I appreciated the organization, and Barsky's quite obvious understanding of the issues that have arisen during Chomsky's "Life of Dissent". But I must refer to my disappointment at the immediate realization that this could hardly reflect the kind of life Chomsky has had. Hence, a 200 plus page book is not a biography. Maybe Barsky promised it was not a biography; I can't remember. To me, however, it doesn't matter. I'm always looking for good stuff by and about Chomsky. Sometimes I find really stimulating material; sometimes I find variations of views that I've seen already; sometimes I find worthless psychobabble. Barsky's book provided some new material (the strain the Faurisson affair on Chomsky was coming close to revelatory, as biographies do) but mostly it covered as much as it could about 40 plus years of intense public activity in the US (of all places) and public scrutiny in the same amount of space allotted for a court judge's decision on where domestic pets can and cannot defecate, and why. Barsky's book is excellent commentary on some significant events in Chomsky's life - in precis form - but comes up short of adequately depicting a life of dissent, especially Noam Chomsky's.