Clive James
Posted on March 19, 2007
Filed Under Reading |
I’ve only read a few pieces here & there by Clive James, but if this is an accurate review, Cultural Amnesia looks to be worth both the price & the heft:
In many cases the portrait of the individual in question is simply a launching pad for the author’s free-associative musings, which tend to spiral around several recurrent themes: the shattering legacy of Nazism and Communism, the two totalitarian movements that overshadowed the 20th century; the dangers posed by ideologies that try to reduce the world’s dazzling complexity to simplistic formulas; and the preciousness and fragility of humanism as a cultural ideal.
Humanism has gotten a good & sometimes deserved drubbing from post-modernism & from scientism, but what the hell else have we got? I aspire to a capacious & generous humanism — I’ll do without the capital H.
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You may have already heard about this, but Clive James is doing a special video series to tie into the book.
It’s 3 x 15 minute web-only films, and the first is up tomorrow on Coco Chanel & the Nazis, Albert Camus and Mao. You might enjoy it.
It should appear here: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/clivejames by tomorrow.