The Roger Scruton Reader

Description

The Roger Scruton Reader is the first comprehensive collection of Scruton's writings, spanning a period of thirty years. It gathers selections from some of his earliest works such as The Aesthetics of Architecture (1979) to his most recent Culture Counts (2007). The book also includes a good number of unpublished essays. It is made up of five sections - the last section of all contains some of Scruton's most pugilistic pieces on Dawkins and on The Iraq War. Scruton holds Burkean political views and his book The Meaning of Conservatism was a response to the growth of liberalism in the Conservative party. At all times he is concerned to shift the right way from economics towards moral issues such as sex education and censorship laws. But he has in fact written on almost every aspect of philosophy - always in prose which is accessible and written with pellucid clarity.

Mark Dooley has held lectureships in philosophy at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, and at University College Dublin where he was also John Henry Newman Scholar in Theology. From 2003-2006, he wrote on foreign affairs for the Sunday Independent. From 2006-2018, he wrote a weekly column on 'Moral Matters' for the Irish Daily Mail. He is currently a Contributing Editor to The European Conservative magazine. He is author of The Politics of Exodus: Kierkegaard's Ethics of Responsibility (2001), The Philosophy of Derrida (2007), Roger Scruton: The Philosopher on Dover Beach (2009), Why Be a Catholic? (2011), Moral Matters: A Philosophy of Homecoming (2015), and Conversations With Roger Scruton (2016). He is editor of Questioning Ethics (1999), Questioning God (2001), A Passion for the Impossible (2003), The Roger Scruton Reader (2009), and Against The Tide: The Best of Roger Scruton's Columns, Commentaries and Criticism (2022). Dooley is Sir Roger Scruton's Literary Executor.

'An excellent introduction to [Scruton's] range of interests' - Kenneth Minogue, Times Literary Supplement "Dooley compiles 16 selected essays by English philosopher Roger Scruton on topics ranging from conservative politics to sex, culture, the environment, wine, and hunting, which were written between 1986 and 2008 (most after 2000). He aims to present a companion to his volume Roger Scruton: The Philosopher on Dover Beach and a text for those wishing to teach Scruton's philosophy or become acquainted with his work. The first group of essays relate to Scruton's political conservatism, followed by sections on his theory of the nation and his ideas about sex and marriage, religion, knowledge, and the role of architecture in human life." -Eithne O'Leyne, BOOK NEWS, Inc. Author article in Irish Daily Mail 'This is a book brimming with observations and arguments, some surprising, many provocative, all engaging.'- Chandran Kukathas, The American Conservative