Witcraft

This is a masterful work of scholarship. On almost every page of this very large book (over 600 pages of text and a further hundred given over to references and Index) there is a quotation used, which is often witty. So far, I’ve only worked my way through a few chapters and found them highly interesting: a mix of philosophy, biographical sketches and many wonderful anecdotes.I opted for the kindle edition as carrying a huge volume around would be unwieldy, and it works very well. The hyperlinked chapter headings and sections all take you to the exact page, and clicking on a word in the Index does almost the same, taking the reader to, if not the exact page, then a page very close by. I used the Index to search for ‘Ayer’ (author of Language, Truth and Logic) and I arrived only a page or two away.The ebook also lends itself to highlighting popular quotes and passages, something I very much enjoy doing myself.Witcraft is different from conventional histories of philosophy; its approach of jumping forward every fifty or so years from 1601 to 1951 is something I’ve not come across before; nor would one expect to find writers such as Cervantes, Coleridge, Mary Wollstonecraft and George Eliot covered in a book of philosophy.The book ends with an excellent chapter on Ludwig Wittgenstein. Indeed, Witcraft is a book that I shall be reading for a very long time, and no doubt dipping into long afterwards.I hope you find my review helpful.

Oh, dear - I had such expectations... I had thought this would be a terrific read; it had all the indications of a fascinating journey through philosophy in the English-speaking world - anecdotal, incidental, informative and aimed at the general reader. However, it turned out to read more like a textbook, dry and overly-detailed; it's style is very much in the 'and then...and then...and then...' school. The author is reluctant to get past the seventeenth century and Descartes in particular. In short, if you are looking for a non-academic and entertaining survey of post-medieval English philosophy, this isn't it. If, on the other hand, you already have a fair understanding of philosophy and seeking a concise history in an academic vein, this may 'float your boat'. I give it three stars as it has a good bio of Wittgenstein in the final section. Be advised however that it is very 'flat' ( it even ends in a very lacklustre manner - as if it was a middle chapter rather than the end - and it could have done with an epilogue to 'round it up', perhaps finishing with a pithy 'bon mot' ).

I seem to be in a minority in not enjoying this book. It is a strange work: a rather rambling dissertation on philosophy in English since the Reformation bolted on to a biography of Wittgenstein which takes up the last quarter of the text. (The acknowledgements explain that the author wrote an essay on “English Philosophy in the Fifties” which his publisher suggested should be expanded and turned into a book). The introduction states that the intention was to present “a carnival rather than a museum: an unruly parade of free spirits…” which is all well and good, but the text leaves a lot of questions unraised or unanswered. For instance, Ree states that there is no essence of “philosophical Englishness” (sic) and that “there is no evidence for the commonplace that philosophy in English has an innate affinity with….empiricism”. This is simply not true. The book begins, as I’ve said, with the Reformation, but before that the “English” – Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, William of Ockham, etc., were punching above their weight on the continent and steering scholasticism in a very empirical direction. You would also need a discussion about what is so special about “English(ness)”- the premise of the book - given that many “English” philosophers were Scots, not to mention the fact that Wittgenstein was Austrian, wrote in German, and derived a lot of his early ideas from Frege. Talking of Wittgenstein, the reader is informed that he was little short of a tramp who “had never been to a university”. In fact Wittgenstein attended the Technische Hochschule Berlin, alma mater of seven Nobel Prize winners, and then the University of Manchester. Wittgenstein’s friends are also castigated for ensuring that he was attended by a priest on his deathbed, a reference note baldly asserting that “Wittgenstein was not a Catholic”. In fact Wittgenstein was a baptised Catholic and received six years’ religious instruction by a priest. As is the case with much of this book, I detect the sound of axes being ground - a philosophical Brexit perhaps?

I enjoyed reading this book and was sorry that it came to an end in 1951. Perhaps it is not yet possible to be frank about the philosophers of the second half of the last century.

This book is a fascinating and erudite read about who and how philosophers slowly brought now familiar concepts into the English language. Such questionable inkhorne Frenchie words in the 1600s, as conscientious, endear, tarnish, facilitate, amusing, regret, effort, emotion. Who knew?! Jonathan Ree did, and write a very readable book.