The Hedgehog And The Fox Av Isaiah Berlin

<p>''Brilliant. Searching and profound'' <b>E.H. Carr, </b><i><b>Times Literary Supplement</b></i><br>''When reading Isaiah Berlin we breathe an altogether different air'' <i><b>New York Review of Books</b></i><br>''Beautifully written'' <b>W. H. Auden, </b><i><b>New Yorker</b></i><br>''Ingenious. Exactly what good critical writing should be'' <b>Max Beloff, </b><i><b>Guardian</b></i><br><br><b><i>The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.</i></b><br><br>For Isaiah Berlin, there is a fundamental distinction in mankind: those who are fascinated by the infinite variety of things - foxes - and those who relate everything to a central all-embracing system - hedgehogs. It can be applied to the greatest creative minds: Dante, Ibsen and Proust are hedgehogs, while Shakespeare, Aristotle and Joyce are foxes.<br><br>Yet when Berlin reaches the case of Tolstoy, he finds a fox by nature, but a hedgehog by conviction; a duality which holds the key to understanding Tolstoy''s