Russell Kirk: Prospects for Conservatives

A Compass for Rediscovering the Permanent Things

Imaginative Conservative Books, 2013 (originally published by Regnery as A Program for Conservatives in 1956)     Amazon

Book Description:

Kirk
“The mind and heart of America, in this tremendous hour, require an inspiration which cannot come out of the party caucus and the editorial room of the daily newspaper.” So writes Russell Kirk in Prospects for Conservatives. Sixty years hence the hour is late, the situation even more dire. Our governing elites, in all areas of social, political, and cultural life, have snapped the central axis of humanity and trampled upon the principles of natural, social, and transcendent order. But such are not ever lost, and it is these that Russell Kirk offers to us in this work – perhaps his best, in terms of style as well as intellectual depth and creativity, as Bradley Birzer notes in his introduction to this new edition.
 
As Dr. Birzer goes on to indicate, the book’s importance lies less in the specific issues it addresses than in its discussion of eternal truths. In Prospects, the author engages problems of the intellect, community, justice, order, loyalty, tradition, and power; and associates each of these either with the seven classical and Christian virtues or with the seven deadly sins. Yes, the hour is late, but transcendent order can never be entirely extinguished, and its re-articulation in Prospects for Conservatives – bringing it into clear view so that it can affect everyday living – is an unexpected grace from the pen of Russell Kirk, given to all whose intellects and imaginations have not yet lost their bearings. In an age when it is all too easily led off course, Dr. Kirk offers American conservatism a sure way forward, and reason for hope in perilous times.
 
Reviews:
 
My 1962 edition, with the original title
My 1962 edition, with the original title

“Originally regarded as the sequel to his landmark book, The Conservative Mind, Prospects is widely regarded as a stand-alone essay in its own right. In it, we are reminded that human beings best flourish in community, where the moral imagination is joined to right reason. Amid modernity’s minefields, wastelands, and pitfalls, readers of Russell Kirk will see hope in the possibilities of renewal for America and the West.”  Gleaves Whitney, Director of the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, Grand Valley State University

“Prospects for Conservatives is a breathtakingly beautiful and wise affirmation of cultural conservatism. And it remains an indispensable guide to both the hope that is central to Kirk’s brand of conservatism, and to the dangers and discontents the current generation of conservatives still must confront.”  Jeffrey O. Nelson, co-editor, American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia

“Russell Kirk follows Edmund Burke and other conservative masters in asserting that the problems of human life are ‘not to be amended overnight by some coffee-house philosopher.’ Instead, Kirk consults serious thinkers who consider fundamental questions and seek for principles, not programmatic solutions.”  Benjamin G. Lockerd, author of Aethereal Rumours: T.S. Eliot’s Physics and Poetics

Praise for earlier editions:

“Mr. Kirk deals faithfully with the smug and sentimental intellectual fashions that have contributed to our demoralized culture.”  The New York Times Book Review

“Professor Kirk has composed a sound and searching tract for our times, written with a vividness that should arouse the most jaded reader.”  Wall Street Journal 

“A Program for Conservatives is a vigorous book, written with conviction, love and indignation.”  Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review

“It has been Russell Kirk’s service to his country to reexamine the fundamentals of conservatism, to face facts that doctrinaire liberalism has glossed over, to ask that most fundamental of questions – What must a man do to be saved? Liberalism’s answer has been in our day disastrous.”  The Christian Science Monitor

 
About the Author:
 
Russell Kirk (1918-1994), historian of ideas, critic, essayist, editor, and novelist, was the author of thirty-two books. Among them are The Conservative Mind, The Roots of American Order, The Politics of Prudence, Enemies of the Permanent Things, and six works of fiction. He received twelve honorary doctorates from American universities and many awards, including the Presidential Citizens Medal.
 
 
 

Edward Shils: Tradition

University of Chicago Press, 2006 (1981)     Amazon
Book Description:
ShilsTradition, by esteemed sociologist Edward Shils, was the first book to fully explore the history, significance, and future of tradition as a whole. Intent on questioning the meaning of the antitraditionalist impulse in today’s society, Shils argues here that the tendency to distrust and rebel against tradition is at the heart of tradition itself; only through suspicion and defiance does tradition actually move forward. Revealing the importance of tradition to social and political institutions, technology, science, literature, religion, and scholarship, Tradition remains the definitive work on this vital element of our society.
Reviews:
“Shils is a man of fabled learning, whose mind purrs powerfully like the moth at dusk. I hesitate to use the word conservative of him because it misses the central concern of his work, which is not conservatism, but the conservation of those human resources and achievements which are richest, and matter most.”  David A. Martin, Times Literary Supplement
“Tradition is the first comprehensive treatment of the subject that encompasses the totality of tradition in all its multifaceted variables and functions….It is a landmark analytical and theoretical sociological study that not only fills a need but also provides a basic model and impetus for further research.”  H. Leon Abrams Jr., Sociology
“Shils tries to explore not this or that tradition, but the role in human societies of tradition as such – in the very wide sense of everything that is traditum, handed down, from one generation to another….Shils merits appreciation for having restated, with much learning and considerable eloquence, the sheer indispensability of tradition to human society.”  Peter L. Berger, New York Times Book Review
About the Author:
Edward Shils (1910-95) was the Distinguished Service Professor in the Committee on Social Thought and in the Department of Sociology at the University of Chicago. He was the author of many books, including The Calling of Education and The Constitution of Society, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

Upprop: Stoppa Kalle Anka på julafton!

Det är dags att än en gång publicera mitt upprop från förra året.

Fanny och Alexander. Innehåller scener med svenskt julfirande före Kalle Anka.
Fanny och Alexander. Innehåller scener med svenskt julfirande före Kalle Anka.

Folk som vet bättre – och de är trots allt många – vågar inte säga det. De tror att de sårar andra, och verkligen inte bara barn. Något måste göras. Någon måste säga det.

Det finns några halvhjärtade och inte sällan förvirrade opinionsbildare och Facebookgrupper med enstaka medlemmar som protesterar. Det räcker inte. Vad som behövs är en stor, kraftfull, enhetlig, rikstäckande kampanj baserad på en precis förståelse av problemets natur.

I själva verket är det mycket enkelt:

De gamla Disneyfilmerna är inte nödvändigtvis dåliga i sin genre. De har sitt värde som bagateller. De som gillar dem och av detta skäl försvarar Kalle Anka på julafton har inte nödvändigtvis dålig smak. Felet är att Kalle Anka på julafton, skapat av svensk TV genom import av en produkt från amerikansk TV och Walt Disney Productions (idag Walt Disney Company, med ofta betydligt mer tvivelaktiga produkter, som årligen betalas en okänd men tvivelsutan stor summa av SVT), inte är, eller inte kan accepteras som, en “svensk tradition”, som framför allt annat definierar den svenska julen. När det blivit detta är det en löjlig och för hela Sverige pinsam ovana.

Det är, menar jag, fel av föräldrar att upprätthålla denna ovana och låta sina barn tillägna sig den. Det måste få ett slut.

Stöd med positiva kommentarer, återblogga, dela och sprid på Facebook och Twitter, skriv egna artiklar o.s.v.! Låt oss starta rörelsen för stoppandet av Kalle Anka på julafton.

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Läs även Förtydligande om Kalle Anka.