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Fools, Frauds and Firebrands

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What to expect

Bloomsbury presents Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left by Roger Scruton, read by Kris Dyer

A devastating critique of New Left thinking.

In Fools, Frauds and Firebrands, Roger Scruton first surveys and then deconstructs the golden idols of left wing thought from the 1960s to the present day. He dissects the hollow works of Hobsbawm and E. P. Thompson, Galbraith and Dworkin, Sartre and Foucault and exposes the lack of coherence in the works of Althusser, Lacan, Deleuze, Badiou and Žižek.

Scruton ponders why the humanities have become so unambiguously aligned to the left, and reveals how fully such thinking has seized the academy in its grasp. In this provocative, compelling and highly entertaining book he explains why empty rhetoric abounds over careful analysis and blatant nonsense over respectable logic, in a shattering demolition of some of today’s most fashionable philosophers.

Critics Review

Eminent British philosopher and polymath Scruton gives a sharp-edged, provocative critique of leading leftist thinkers since the mid-twentieth century ... complex and erudite.
Publisher's Weekly US
Caustic, highly recherché, and simply great fun to read for the questing intellectual soul.
Kirkus Reviews
From the standpoint of a serious conservatism, it honestly assesses the political and philosophical contributions of the Left. The book also addresses what is likely our most pressing question: ‘Can there be any foundation for resistance to the leftist agenda without religious faith?'
Catholic World Report
Since he no longer has a university career to protect, Scruton can now tweak the nose of academic leftism to his heart’s content… Scruton is at his best, (and funniest) when trying to make sense of [Alain] Badiou’s weird confection historical materialism and Platonic mathematical theory.
Prospect
The book is a masterpiece ... In crisp, sometimes brilliant prose, Mr. Scruton considers scores of works in three languages, giving the reader an understanding of each thinker’s overarching aim and his place within the multifaceted movement known as the New Left. He neither ridicules nor abuses the writers he considers; he patiently deconstructs them, first explaining their work in terms they themselves would recognize and then laying bare their warped assumptions and empty pretensions.
Wall Street Journal
I enjoyed this immensely, both for Scruton's dry, British wit as well as for the sheer breadth of intellectuals covered in his survey.
Against the Grain Blog
Highly recommended
Powerline US Blog
Here Scruton thoroughly and fairly debunks the ostentation, obfuscation, and terrible writing and downright deceitfulness of much of postwar Marxist-inspired philosophy. For Scruton the culprits are mainly from France and Germany—beginning with Sartre and carrying through to Foucault, Habermas, Althusser, Lacan, Deleuze, Gramsci, and Said—and he carries the attack forward to Badiou and Žižek. Even Galbraith and Dworkin take a few hits. Scruton writes from the perspective of an old-school conservative. His sympathies are with the virtues of the countryside and historically rooted associations of every sort, from churches and the US Constitution to volunteer fire departments, brass bands, and the local Grange. His personal point of view could be called sentimental … but his arguments against his foes are substantial and deep. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.
CHOICE
Author Roger Scruton
Narrator Kris Dyer
Duration 15 hours and 17 minutes
Release Date
ISBN 9781399435918
Format Audiobook
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing
Genre Left-of-centre democratic ideologies, Political science and theory, Social and political philosophy
Availability AU, GB, IE, US

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