13 May 2014

Chris Hedges goes palaeo

I just had the pleasure of reading a very interesting and powerful piece by Chris Hedges on Truthout. Chris Hedges is always worth a read; he first came to my notice for his critique of fundamentalism, followed by his critique of the nouveau atheists. He is very much a man of the Left, but here his emphasis on imagination and noblesse oblige, and their devalued place in modern and postmodern society, has some very tantalisingly Tory overtones, in which I see a lot of similarity to my own development of Tory sympathies (particularly in his emphasis on the traditions of the Iroquois and the Lakota). His read on Shakespeare as the prototypical anti-modernist over-against the Puritans is also highly interesting, and shares some similarities with Allan Bloom’s read of the Bard. Lastly, I do wonder if Hedges’ theme of the importance of imagination is deliberately Kirkian...

At any rate, a brilliant and noteworthy piece! Please do give it a read!

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