How the French Think: An Affectionate Portrait of an Intellectual People

by Sudhir Hazareesingh

Overview

An award-winning historian presents an absorbing account of the French mind, shedding light on France's famous tradition of intellectual life

Why are the French such an exceptional nation? Why do they think they are so exceptional? The French take pride in the fact that their history and culture have decisively shaped the values and ideals of the modern world. French ideas are no less distinct in their form: while French thought is abstract, stylish and often opaque, it has always been bold and creative, and driven by the relentless pursuit of innovation.

In How the French Think, the internationally-renowned historian Sudhir Hazareesingh tells the epic and tumultuous story of French intellectual thought from Descartes, Rousseau, and Auguste Comte to Sartre, Claude Lé-Strauss, and Derrida. He shows how French thinking has shaped fundamental Westerns ideas about freedom, rationality, and justice, and how the French mind-set is intimately connected to their own way of life-in particular to the French tendency towards individualism, their passion for nature, their celebration of their historical heritage, and their fascination with death. Hazareesingh explores the French veneration of dissent and skepticism, from Voltaire to the Dreyfus Affair and beyond; the obsession with the protection of French language and culture; the rhetorical flair embodied by the philosophes, which today's intellectuals still try to recapture; the astonishing influence of French postmodern thinkers, including Foucault and Barthes, on postwar American education and life, and also the growing French anxiety about a globalized world order under American hegemony.

How the French Think sweeps aside generalizations and easy stereotypes to offer an incisive and revealing exploration of the French intellectual tradition. Steeped in a colorful range of sources, and written with warmth and humor, this book will appeal to all lovers of France and of European culture.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780465032495
Publisher:	Basic Books
Publication date:	09/22/2015
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.40(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

Sudhir Hazareesingh is a Fellow in Politics at Balliol College, Oxford, a Fellow of the British Academy, and author of the prize-winning books The Legend of Napoleon and In the Shadow of the General. He divides his time between Paris and Oxford.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter One: The Skull of Descartes

Chapter Two: Darkness and Light

Chapter Three: Landscapes of Utopia

Chapter Four: The Ideals of Science

Chapter Five: To the Left, and to the Right

Chapter Six: The Sum of Their Parts

Chapter Seven: Freedom and Domination

Chapter Eight: Writing for Everybody

Chapter Nine: The End of History

Chapter Ten: The Closing of the French Mind

Conclusion: Anxiety and Optimism

Editorial Reviews

07/20/2015
Hazareesingh (The Legend of Napoleon), a professor of politics at Balliol College, Oxford, comes close to producing an intellectual history of modern France, from René Descartes to such poststructuralist thinkers as Claude Lévi-Strauss and Michel Foucault. But it is not quite that; instead, Hazareesingh addresses broad themes in French thought, including the “interplay... between the cold linearity of Descartes and the unbridled expansiveness of Rousseau”; the “lively French tradition of dissent, contrarianism, and impertinence”; the widespread belief in “providential leadership” that has fueled the rise of individuals from Napoleon to de Gaulle; and the “declinist sensibility” in recent French thought as manifested in the writings of such figures as Éric Zemmour and Alain Finkielkraut. Hazareesingh also offers a surprising insight on the extent of supernaturalism in French thought and politics, noting that, despite a longstanding French commitment to rationalism, leaders from Robespierre to Mitterrand have consulted astrologers. The main weakness of Hazareesingh’s book is that he covers too much ground in not enough space and in the process assumes of his readership too much familiarity with French thinkers. Despite this flaw, this is an equally informative and colorful tour d’horizon of the many strands of, and contradictions in, French philosophy and political thought during the past four centuries. (Oct.)

Publishers Weekly

"An impressive study."—Economist

"A thoughtful, stimulating and witty historical survey of French thought."—Financial Times

"Superb.... Hazareesingh has done more than anyone writing in English to unravel what the sociologist Emmanuel Todd recently called the 'le mystere francais.'"—Prospect (UK)

"Scholarly, penetrating and sometimes very funny.... This is a marvellous, and marvellously readable book: by turns illuminating, affectionate and exasperated."—Independent (UK)

"A stimulating contribution.... In this work [Hazareesingh] displays not only a deep familiarity with French society, but a rare sense for a foreigner of what really matters in French intellectual life once you dig below the surface. He is an excellent teller of tales with a good eye for the revealing anecdote."—New York Review of Books

"Focusing with great intelligence and subtlety on distinctively French conceptions of history, nationhood, democratic participation, existentialism, and the creative tension between order and imagination.... Anyone who loves, loathes, or is just perplexed by self-styled French intellectuals--that is, most educated French people--should read this book.—Foreign Affairs

"[An] engaging, accessible book.... Hazareesingh's superbly researched work traces the history of this spirit, from Descartes, Rousseau and Voltaire to latter-day politicians who talk of France's 'great destiny'. Read this excellent book and next time you witness vigorous finger-pointing in a bistrot, you'll know why the subject being debated is likely to be very lofty indeed!"—France Today

"Hazareesingh has a gift for distilling mounds of information into clear, engrossing prose. This is above all a convivial book, true to its subtitle though not without a finely tuned bullshit detector.... What one comes away with is the unshakable sense that however they do it, the French really do think differently than we do--and this is what we love about them."—New Republic

"Few historians would have the courage to write a book with a title like How the French Think. But few historians know France, and the French, better than Sudhir Hazareesingh. He has brought his formidable knowledge and experience of the country to bear in a book that is consistently engaging and thought-provoking, and written with a light touch that makes it a delight to read."—David Bell, author of The First Total War: Napoleon's Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know It

"It is unusual to laugh aloud when reading a history of ideas, but I did so more than once while reading How the French Think. Its sweep is thrilling and its expositions lucid, but it carries its learning lightly and is written with an astringent wit. Everyone interested in France and the French will enjoy and learn from this book."—Robert Tombs, professor of French history at Cambridge University

"Stendhal wrote that a novel was 'un miroir qu'on promene le long d'un chemin.' And no better mirror on the wandering path of French culture of yesterday and today could be found than this wise and gentle book, as learned as it is engaging. Peguy was worried about what God would have to think about if the French were not there to amuse and inform him. Now we know why this might still be so."—Patrice Higonnet, professor of French history at Harvard University

From the Publisher

2015-06-15
A dense, thoughtful study by a Mauritius-born native achieves the right distance from and intimacy with his subject. While sharing enormous sympathies with the French language and culture, Hazareesingh (Politics/Balliol Coll., Oxford; The Legend of Napoleon; In the Shadow of the General, 2005, etc.) also maintains his academic reserve. In a series of scholarly essays, the author probes the intellectual currents that have fed that distinctive esprit français since the time of Louis XIV to the more pessimistic present. Indeed, the Grand Siècle saw not only the apotheosis of absolute monarchy at Versailles, dazzling intellectual salons, fashion, and cuisine, but also the epoch of Descartes, the philosopher who set out the rationalist tug of war between mind and matter, soul and thought that would plague and elate the French ever since. The author looks at how the writing of Descartes was appropriated by many different, conflicting parties over the centuries, from Christian to anticlerical to feminist, but celebrated as the "emblem of republican rationalism" that would triumph with the French Revolution. French thought is nothing if not contradictory, and while the Enlightenment thinking ushered in a "detached, skeptical and critical self," Hazareesingh also emphasizes the long French flirtation with the occult and supernatural, culminating in President François Mitterrand's obsession with astrological predictions. Fantasies of utopia, from Rousseau to Victor Hugo, dovetail nicely with the French proclivity for scientific inventiveness, precision, and accuracy, while the concepts of left and right that rupture French politics to this day are deeply rooted in the French Revolution. Naturally, the cult of Napoleon garners its own chapter. The new pessimism that the author attempts to articulate seems to emanate from France's acute awareness of its slipping relevance in world influence—certainly next to the English language and American culture—and a deep anxiety over immigration and its ruling elite. A rarefied and compelling study.

Kirkus Reviews