Bertrand Russell (1872–1970)

This review is two-fold.
The book as product is simply gorgeous. 5 stars review if evere there were any for audiobooks' quality. Audio is perfect; graphic design of the cover is elegant and accurate; the narrator impersonates the very core or Russell's witty but serious personality, even conveying the author's respect or contempt for a philosopher through the tone of voice used during quotations of direct passages.

This last peculiarity of the book as a product opens to the principal characetristic of the book as a piece of thought. The title of this work is deceiving. What Russell wrote is not a HISTORY, but a CRITIQUE of Western philosophy, conceived by the point of view of the school of thought of which he was part, analytic empiricism. The work has been defined biased, first of all by Russell himself who advocated for intellectual honesty and considered calls for impartiality, in matters such as view of the worls of the basis of ethics, as contradictory and dangerously deceptive. I agree so much with his opinions in this regard, that I will go as far as saying that it is not bias what is regularly, coherently and openly stated as the view of the writer.
And believe me, you can tell Russell's views from one mile away! He demolishes Plato, Romanticism, Nietzsche, Schopenauer, Fichte and Bergson, to name some. There is a plan in this critique, and it becomes clear in the last few chapters, when he explains how, in his opinions, analytica philosophy solves the internal inconsistency of all the past philosophical schools and thinkers that tried to explain existence, and provide ethical guidance, in one great system based on metaphisics. In my opinion, recognising this feature of the work answers to the critiques about the unbalance between the stance taken in the three historical periods in which he divides the History of Philosophy: classical times, Middle Ages and modernity. I will not go into details, as many reviewers with a better historical and philosophical culture than mine have already written about the question. There is a lot of imprecision and too much generalisation, in my opinion, in delineating historical frameworks and in judging the Scholastic school, for example. Well, that was the state of the art regarding Medieval thought, at Russell's time, and anyway I forgive him all his flaws because I share much of his bias, except that I am an unrepented Marxist of Maoist tendencies... What I love in Russell is his honesty, his human empathy, his concern for the irrationalistic tendency and for the despise of patient analysis that characterised his times: keep in mind that he wrote during WWII. Not that OUR times are much more promising.
Whether you think he was right or not, this book makes for an enthralling listening (or reading) and still constitutes a classic of popularisation. Well, half-way popularisation; if you have no clue of what Western philosophy is, I would give advice for other books as a first general recognition.
Then, when you feel ready, come back and read this book.… (mehr)