MICHAEL BURLEIGH - A WRITER WITH WHOM I NEED TO BECOME MORE FAMILIAR

John J. Miller announces:

On Between the Covers today, we have a podcast interview with Michael Burleigh, author of Blood & Rage: A Cultural History of Terrorism. We discuss why he regards terrorists as "morally insane," whether terrorism is ever justified, how the European view of terrorism differs from the American view, and his involvement with the excellent new British magazine Standpoint (which he describes as a cross between Commentary, Prospect, and National Review). His daily blog on the Standpoint website is here.

Jonah Goldberg writes over at the Corner:

Since John Miller brings him up, I thought I should add a few things. Michael Burleigh's majestic book, The Third Reich: A New History was an enormous influence on me. It is a fantastic piece of work that draws considerable intellectual inspiration from Eric Voegelin's work on "political religions." Two other books by Burleigh, Sacred Causes and Earthly Powers, trace the religious instinct within nominally secular politics. The religious impulse cannot be destroyed, only misdirected to areas where some people can't see through its secular disguise. Nobody's work has ever been more successful — as far as I am aware — at demonstrating this fundamental insight to the affairs of man.  I haven't read  Burleigh's latest book yet, but I plan to.

Andrew Strattaford adds:

FWIW, I wrote about Blood & Rage for the New Criterion here.