Sel Letters B Russell I CL

By turns impassioned, acutely analytical, witty and peevish, these 240 candid letters--all but one previously unpublished--provide an unparalleled intimate glimpse of British philosopher Russell's (1872-1970) private life. We see the solitary, morbidly introspective child manipulated by the domineering grandmother who raised him, and the priggish young lover who escaped his family by plunging into a disastrous marriage with Quaker feminist Alys Pearsall Smith. After their bitter divorce, Russell had an obsessive, clinging affair with freewheeling Lady Ottoline Morrell, a politician's wife who liberated his repressed sexuality. Skillfully linked to one another by commentary and notes, the letters reflect Russell's compulsive hunger for affection, his support for women's suffrage, his early jingoist defense of British imperialism and his philosophical forays into ethics, logic and mathematics. Griffin, a Canadian philosophy professor, also edited Russell's Collected Papers. (July)