Autobiography

Bertrand Russell

Psychology Press, 1998 - Biography & Autobiography - 750 pages

Bertrand Russell was born in 1872 and died in 1970. One of the most influential figures of the twentieth century, he transformed philosophy and can lay claim to being one of the greatest philosophers of all time. He was a Nobel Prize winner for Literature and was imprisoned several times as a result of his pacifism. His views on religion, education, sex, politics and many other topics, made him one of the most read and revered writers of the age. This, his autobiography, is one of the most compelling and vivid ever written.
This one-volume, compact paperback edition contains an introduction by the politician and scholar, Michael Foot, which explores the status of this classic nearly 30 years after the publication of the final volume.

Contents

• Acknowledgements: viii
• Childhood: 33
• Cambridge: 53
• Engagement: 72
• First Marriage: 126
• Principia Mathematica: 147
• Cambridge Again: 210
• 19141944: 237
• IO China: 357
• Second Marriage: 385
• Later Years of Telegraph House: 429
• America 19381944: 459
• 19441967: 505
• At Home and Abroad: 557
• Trafalgar Square: 595
• The Foundation: 652
• Postscript: 725

Popular passages

Page 749 - Three Passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life : the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind. These passions, like great winds, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair.

Page 738 - Sorrow is knowledge : they who know the most Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth, The tree of knowledge is not that of life.

Page 732 - Echoes of cries of pain reverberate in my heart. Children in famine, victims tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a mockery of what human life should be. I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, and I too suffer.

About the author

Bertrand Arthur William Russell (1872-1970) was a British philosopher, logician, essayist and social critic. He was best known for his work in mathematical logic and analytic philosophy. Together with G.E. Moore, Russell is generally recognized as one of the main founders of modern analytic philosophy. Together with Kurt Gödel, he is regularly credited with being one of the most important logicians of the twentieth century. Over the course of a long career, Russell also made contributions to a broad range of subjects, including the history of ideas, ethics, political and educational theory, and religious studies. General readers have benefited from his many popular writings on a wide variety of topics. After a life marked by controversy--including dismissals from both Trinity College, Cambridge, and City College, New York--Russell was awarded the Order of Merit in 1949 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. Noted also for his many spirited anti-nuclear protests and for his campaign against western involvement in the Vietnam War, Russell remained a prominent public figure until his death at the age of 97.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Autobiography
• Author: Bertrand Russell
• Edition: illustrated, reprint, reissue
• Publisher: Psychology Press, 1998
• ISBN: 0415189853, 9780415189859
• Length: 750 pages
• Subjects: Biography & Autobiography / Historical; Biography & Autobiography / Philosophers; Philosophy / General; Philosophy / History & Surveys / Modern; Philosophy / Individual Philosophers