Michael Ignatieff is the author of Isaiah Berlin and The Warrior's Honor, and over fifteen other acclaimed books, including a memoir, The Russian Album, and the Booker finalist novel Scar Tissue. He writes regularly for the New York Times, the New York Review of Books, and the London Review of Books. Former head of Canada's Liberal Party, director of the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard's Kennedy School, and president of Central European University, he is currently a professor at CEU in Vienna.
"On Consolation is an ambitious restoration project, a survey
course of Eurocentric anguish from Job to the Polish poet Czeslaw
Milosz . . . Ignatieff believes that holy texts of all
denominations can be mined for comfort and insight even by the
faithless, [in] their depiction, over frequent revisions, of common
human experience. Maybe, against Sartre, heaven is other
people."
--The New York Times Book Review
"This erudite and heartfelt survey reminds us that the need for
consolation is timeless, as are the inspiring words and examples of
those who walked this path before us."
--Toronto Star
"On Consolation could not be more urgent . . . Ignatieff wants to
re-acquaint us moderns with the old ways we've left behind, and to
remind us that some problems are, by their nature, beyond the
powers of technology and good government."
--Ash Carter, Air Mail
"Compelling."
--Maclean's
"A thoughtful book . . . Especially moving are the final chapters
in which Ignatieff profiles poets of the Holocaust and Cicely
Saunders, founder of the hospice movement . . . This meaningful
work will be compelling and comforting for readers looking for
perspective and balance."
--Booklist
"Erudite and elegant . . . Ignatieff's vivid biographical sketches
of his subjects holding themselves together through failures,
terminal illness, or looming execution . . . inspire and, in their
way, console."
--Publishers Weekly "An inspiration for those in needs of words to
carry on with life."
--Kirkus Reviews
"A poignant reminder that to seek consolation or comfort is, in
many ways, one of the most universally human things one can
do."
--Shelf Awareness "In an age when we are so much in need of solace,
Michael Ignatieff went looking for it in texts and times whose
assumptions are profoundly different from our own. The result is a
secular reinterpretation of a landscape that has often seemed
visible only through a religious lens: it is elegant, humane and
intensely rewarding."
--Kwame Anthony Appiah, author of The Lies that Bind: Rethinking
Identity "It is at once illuminating, moving and itself consoling,
to follow Michael Ignatieff as he searches for moments of
consolation across the centuries. More often than not, he finds
these moments not where one would most expect them but in
surprising places--in the failure of Cicero's stoicism; in Marcus
Aurelius' sleepless nights, in Boethius' odd flash of bleak comedy,
in the illusory dreams of Karl and Jenny Marx. And with resolute
honesty Ignatieff follows the search into his own inner life,
grappling, as we all must do, with failure, loss, and death."
--Stephen Greenblatt, author of The Swerve: How the World Became
Modern "A wonderful balance of literary survey and personal
reflection, this book is wide-ranging, moving, and stylishly
written. It makes the perfect introduction to a genre that never
goes out of fashion."
--Sarah Bakewell, author of How to Live and At the Existentialist
Café "An extraordinary meditation on loss and mortality, drawing on
all of Michael Ignatieff's powers as a philosopher, a historian, a
politician, and a man. His portraits of figures such as Hume and
Montaigne are sharp and dignified, troubling and consoling,
thoughtful and deeply humane."
--Rory Stewart, author of The Places in Between "This is an
extraordinarily moving book. The idea of solidarity in time is
itself consoling, amidst so much loss: in Ignatieff's words, 'we
are not alone, and we never have been.'"
--Emma Rothschild, author of The Inner Life of Empires "Michael
Ignatieff's eloquent search for consolation is itself consoling.
His confidence in old wisdoms suits our new circumstances. This is
a book splendidly immune to the panics of our age, written in an
affecting spirit of humility by a man of uncommon intelligence who
has a rare gift for keeping his head. For many of its readers On
Consolation will be--is there any higher praise for a study of this
subject?--useful."
--Leon Wieseltier, author of Kaddish "Illuminating and moving,
these wide-ranging portraits of men and women seeking answers in
dark times--from the Book of Job to Montaigne, from Cicero to
Akhmatova, and on to today's palliative care--appeal to us all, as
a universal quest and an intimate personal testament."
--Jenny Uglow, author of Mr. Lear: A Life of Art and Nonsense "A
passionate, thought-provoking, unpredictable book."
--Carlo Ginzburg, author of Threads and Traces
"With this book, On Consolation, we are gifted with deeply
perceptive insights on eternal truths with a contemporary lens,
toward a desperately-needed restoration of communal hope from
Canada's great intellectual powerhouse, Michael Ignatieff."
--Lieutenant-General (ret) The Honourable Roméo Dallaire
"Human problems are like crystals: they have so many faces that
they must be turned over and around many times in order to see
every side. Michael Ignatieff's ruminative On Consolation does that
artfully. Reading his memorable portraits of historical figures who
needed, sought, lost, or found consolation leaves the reader with a
deeper appreciation of the profound challenges and possibilities
that life lays before every one of us."
--Mark Lilla, author of The Reckless Mind
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