Three Critics of the Enlightenment

Blurb

Three Critics of the Enlightenment: Vico, Hamann, Herder is a collection of essays in the history of philosophy by 20th century philosopher and historian of ideas Isaiah Berlin. Edited by Henry Hardy and released posthumously in 2000, the collection comprises the previously published works Vico and Herder: Two Studies in the History of Ideas – an essay on Counter-Enlightenment thinkers Giambattista Vico and Johann Gottfried Herder – and The Magus of the North: J. G. Hamann and the Origins of Modern Irrationalism, concerning irrationalist Johann Georg Hamann. Berlin's initial interest in the critics of the Enlightenment arose through reading the works of Marxist historian of ideas Georgi Plekhanov.
Vico and Herder are portrayed by Berlin as alternatives to the rationalistic epistemology which characterized the Enlightenment. Berlin held that the agenda of the Enlightenment could be understood in a number of ways, and that to view it from the perspectives of its critics was to bring its distinctive and controversial aspects into sharp focus.