The Crooked Timber of Humanity: Chapters in the History of Ideas - Isaiah Berlin - Hardcover... Book

The Crooked Timber of Humanity is not an ode to conformity as some radicals might describe it, but an attempt to show our complexity as human beings.

Isaiah Berlin has a reputation for being a magnificent essayist but this book has exceeded my expectations.
Basically, you' ll get a good grasp of his value pluralism notion and become more skeptical towards utopian ideologies. Enlightenment was the triumph of reason and logic but the romantics soon showed its flaws, depicting the human condition as a warfield where equally valid but contradictory values are in constant conflict towards one another. Soon though, romantic idealism led to the disastrous events of the 20th century, a century with endless bloodshed and suffering.

Our tragedy as human beings is, that we're forced to make choices sacrificing our unreflectiveness and absolutism and perhaps one part of ourselves in this process. Ideologies offering redemption, while necessary in order to broaden our horizons, offer little else, since they fail to encapsulate what makes us who we are. Berlin draws from the counter-enlightenment tradition (a term which I think he was the first to coin) but deals all historical movements and ideas with the outmost respect. His essay on Joseph De-Maistre for example, while critical and bitter towards some of his conclusions, remains a wonderfully balanced approach to a controversial figure. It also works as a prelude towards this book's last essay-also wonderful-, which discussed the then evident rise of fascism in Europe. I wish Berlin was still alive, offering his calm and insightful thoughts in today's similar landscape. From the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.