The life and thought of Herbert Butterfield: history, science, and God
Once recalled only for The Whig Interpretation of History (1931) and Christianity and History (1949), Sir Herbert Butterfield's contribution to western culture has undergone an astonishing revaluation over the past twenty years. What has been left out of this reappraisal is the man himself. Yet...
| Résumé: | Once recalled only for The Whig Interpretation of History (1931) and Christianity and History (1949), Sir Herbert Butterfield's contribution to western culture has undergone an astonishing revaluation over the past twenty years. What has been left out of this reappraisal is the man himself. Yet the force of Butterfield's writings is weakened without some knowledge of the man behind them: his temperament, contexts and personal torments. Previous authors have been unable to supply a rounded portrait for lack of available material, particularly a dearth of sources for the crucial period before the outbreak of war in 1939. Michael Bentley's original, startling 2011 biography draws on sources never seen before. They enable him to present a new Butterfield, one deeply troubled by self-doubt, driven by an urgent sexuality and plagued by an unending tension between history, science and God in a mind as hard and cynical as it was loving and charitable pt. 1. Private Intellectual, 1900-1945 -- Brontë country -- Peterhouse and Princeton -- Love, marriage, and "the sex question" -- Thinking man's historian -- European civilization and the Third Reich -- Wartime ambiguities -- pt. 2. Contours of an original mind -- Science -- God -- History -- pt. 3. Public intellectual, 1945-1979 -- Height of his powers -- From history to historiography -- From diplomatic history to international relations -- From autumn to winter |
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| Description: | Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015) |
| ISBN: | 0511782470 |
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511782473 |