My Book Reviews

For the Children of Gaza, M.Staunton & R. Masilo (eds.), Onslaught Press, Oxford, 2014 My copy of this book We all remember those controversial lines that end John Keats' famous poem "Ode on a Grecian Urn," words that were variously interpreted over the centuries and even critically dismissed by some as a weakness in the actual poem.  Those words are the most discussed two lines in all of Keats’s poetry –  " 'Beauty is truth; truth beauty',” – that is all/Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." The exact meaning of those lines is disputed by everyone; no less a critic than TS Eliot considered them a blight upon an otherwise beautiful poem. Dennis Deane settled the quotation issue by pointing out that this particular formula "Beauty is truth; truth beauty" is precisely the formula used by the Artist Sir Joshua Reynolds, PRA,FRS,FRSA, an eighteenth century English painter whose specialty was portraiture. (see HERE  ) He is fam...

1  Bad Thoughts: A Guide to Clear Thinking , Jamie Whyte (2003), London: Corvo. My copy of Whyte Jamie Whyte is a past lecturer of philosophy at Cambridge University and winner of Analysis journal's prestigious prize for the best article by a philosopher under 30. He is a New Zealander.  He is now around 49 years of age and is a politician, or at least an aspiring one in his country of birth - See  HERE .  This is a book written for the total neophyte in philosophy.  It aims to expose common "crimes" (an exaggeration surely)  against good thinking - and indeed there are many of those encountered on our daily rounds no matter what our profession is.  He tells us that the genesis of this wee book is his "outrage" (is he poking fun?) at errors in reasoning, muddled thinking and logical fallacies committed all too widely.  He further informs us that initially he wrote to papers as a way of expressing, or indeed expiating, this anger and...

(i)  Philosophy: 100 Essential Thinkers: The Ideas that have shaped our World,  Philip Stokes (2012), London: Arcturus. My copy of this book In short, this is an excellent introductory text to the history of philosophy.  It makes the perfect present for any relative or friend who is beginning the subject either at the higher level of secondary education or first year in a university or college.  It locates every philosopher within his particular grouping or school and historical period from the Presocratics right up through the centuries to the Post-Modernists and what the author terms the New Scientists.  In this wonderfully clear book, Philip Stokes, a publisher and author of young adult fiction shows a considerable grasp of the whole gamut of Western Philosophy.  He also gives a pithy sentence  that summarizes the essence of each philosopher's thought just under the title of each chapter - no easy task that, to give us each philos...