A Terribly Serious Adventure: Philosophy at Oxford 1900-60

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A TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023

'A real achievement' New Statesman

'Beautifully portrays - and exemplifies - the combined wit and profundity, exuberance and rigour, of Oxford analytic philosophy' TLS

What are the limits of language How to bring philosophy closer to everyday life What makes a good human being

These were among the questions that philosophers wrestled with in mid-twentieth-century Britain, a period shadowed by war and the rise of fascism. In response to these events, thinkers such as Gilbert Ryle, J. L. Austin, Elizabeth Anscombe and Iris Murdoch aspired to a new level of watchfulness and self-awareness about language. Being vigilant about their words was their way to keep philosophy true to everyday experience.

A Terribly Serious Adventure traces the friendships and the rivalries, the shared preoccupations and the passionate disagreements of Oxford's most brilliant thinkers. Nikhil Krishnan brings his knowledge and understanding of philosophy to bear on the lives and intellectual achievements of a large and lively cast of characters. Together, they stood for a compelling moral vision of philosophy that is still with us today.

Reviews

'Ordinary Language can hardly convey how much I loved this book. I golloped it down like a pot of honey, then started again' - Keith Miller, 'Books of the Year 2023'

'An account of thought at Oxford from 1900-1960 that weaves biography with philosophy and somehow attains a pellucid clarity ... spirited, though frequently wry ... in passage after passage of fierce analysis, Krishnan offers a fresh justification of a fiercely practical project' - Sunday Telegraph

'One of the finest writers we have ... [Krishnan] writes with the discipline of a scholar and the story-telling skill of a novelist, with empathy, humour, and a ringing clarity' - Hindu

'Nikhil Krishnan's terrific new book, A Terribly Serious Adventure, tells the story of the heyday of linguistic philosophy' - Spectator

'A Terribly Serious Adventure beautifully portrays - and exemplifies - the combined wit and profundity, exuberance and rigour, of Oxford analytic philosophy' - TLS

Author Bio

Nikhil Krishnan is a Fellow in Philosophy at Robinson College, Cambridge. He completed his doctorate in Philosophy at Balliol College, Oxford. His essays and reviews have appeared in the New Yorker, New Statesman, Daily Telegraph and Literary Review.