- Hardcover: 128 pages
- Publisher: Hamish Hamilton (1 Jan 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0241144337
- ISBN-13: 978-0241144336
- Product Dimensions: 17.8 x 13 x 1.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 54,885 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
The pleasures of kindness have been well known since the dawn of Western thought. Kindness, declared Marcus Aurelius, was mankind's 'greatest delight' - and centuries-worth of thinkers and writers have echoed him. But today many people seem to find these pleasures literally incredible. Instead of embracing the benefits of kindness, as a species we seem to be becoming deeply and fundamentally antagonistic to each other, with motives that are generally self-seeking.This book explains how and why this has come about, and argues that the affectionate life - a life lived in instinctive sympathetic identification with the vulnerabilities and attractions of others - is the one we should all be inclined to live. 'We mutually belong to one another,' as the philosopher Alan Ryan writes, and the good life is one 'that reflects this truth'. What the Victorians called 'open-heartedness' and the Christians 'caritas' remains essential to our emotional and mental health, for reasons both obvious and hidden, argue the authors of this elegant and indispensable exploration of the concept of kindness.
About the Author
Adam Phillips is a psychoanalyst and the author of twelve previous books, all widely acclaimed, including On Kissing, Tickling and Being Bored, Going Sane and most recently Side Effects. Barbara Taylor is a historian who has published several well-known books on the history of feminism, including an award-winning study of nineteenth-century socialist feminism, Eve and the New Jerusalem, and an intellectual biography of the pioneer feminist Mary Wollstonecraft.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
21 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
The authors see kindness as an essential part of what makes us human, what unites us with others; and as one of humanity's greatest pleasures, essential for our health, relationships and society. But, they detect, we have become afraid of strangers, of showing kindness and seeing kindness in others, in those close to us too.
The book explores how we are let down by the ways we think about kindness and uncovers an enlightening, hopeful and deeply resonant way for us to understand and imagine kindness.
This small book moved me to tears, stirred me to listen closer to my instincts, and made me want to give it to as many people I can.
The book explores how we are let down by the ways we think about kindness and uncovers an enlightening, hopeful and deeply resonant way for us to understand and imagine kindness.
This small book moved me to tears, stirred me to listen closer to my instincts, and made me want to give it to as many people I can.
34 of 43 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Since I'd not checked, I expected this book to be more substantial than it actually is. At only 117 pages that's nearly 8p a page. However the book does have a sturdy hardback binding and a narrow silky bookmark sewn into the spine.
I bought this as an antidote to the modern dawkinsian view that we're all selfish and the gainful end always justifies the means, nomatter how machievellean.
It was featured in the Guardian's Review supplement, and I was rather attracted to all the allusions to great philosophers. As such I was expecting something slightly more academic and deeper. Instead it skims gently across the surface like a swallow skimming a millpond in summer.
In other words this book is not a philosophy or psychology textbook, in spite of the authors' qualifications and background, but ought to suit most readers, especially those who remember more courteous times. And, perhaps, it would provide some food for ethical thought for those who don't.
But then, I suppose, the latter type will probably just nick a copy from the library.
I bought this as an antidote to the modern dawkinsian view that we're all selfish and the gainful end always justifies the means, nomatter how machievellean.
It was featured in the Guardian's Review supplement, and I was rather attracted to all the allusions to great philosophers. As such I was expecting something slightly more academic and deeper. Instead it skims gently across the surface like a swallow skimming a millpond in summer.
In other words this book is not a philosophy or psychology textbook, in spite of the authors' qualifications and background, but ought to suit most readers, especially those who remember more courteous times. And, perhaps, it would provide some food for ethical thought for those who don't.
But then, I suppose, the latter type will probably just nick a copy from the library.
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
What a waste of a Sunday afternoon.
This book is not an interesting set of facts, nor an argument in favour of anything.
It is simply a lot of dubious points slung together rather poorly. We get a laughable Freudian argument that we fear kindness because we wanted to sleep with our mothers!
A short left wing political tantrum without justification or purpose and a rather poor historical overview with facts twisted painfully to support it.
Neither philosophical, political, sociological, nor pedagogical, in a word pointless!
Save your money.
This book is not an interesting set of facts, nor an argument in favour of anything.
It is simply a lot of dubious points slung together rather poorly. We get a laughable Freudian argument that we fear kindness because we wanted to sleep with our mothers!
A short left wing political tantrum without justification or purpose and a rather poor historical overview with facts twisted painfully to support it.
Neither philosophical, political, sociological, nor pedagogical, in a word pointless!
Save your money.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Unimpressed
As a previous reviewer mentioned this is an extremely slim offering. It seems to seek to display the reading lists of the authors rather than clearly define or properly evaluate... Read more
Published on 10 July 2009 by Jim
elegant manifesto
A beautifully written manifesto in favor of the lost art - and pleasure - of kindness.
Published on 10 Jan 2009 by Sarah Knott
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