Adam Smith: An Enlightened Life

By: Nicholas Phillipson

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into Bookshare to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis: 'The Smith who emerges from this thoughtful study is not the modern caricature. He is, rather, a man of his times, steeped in Enlightenment culture . . . he had an intellect of extraordinary brilliance, and it is the life of that intellect that is finely portrayed in this book' Noel Malcolm, Sunday Telegraph Adam Smith is celebrated as the author of the Wealth of Nations And The founder of modern economics. Yet Smith saw himself primarily as a philosopher rather than an economist, whose life's work was to establish a grand 'Science of Man', which was unfinished on his death and was one of the greatest projects of the European Enlightenment. Providing a radical new account of Smith's life And The intellectual ferment that gave rise to his ideas, this is a surprising and compelling portrait of one of the greatest minds of his age. 'A wonderful, thought-provoking book' Robert Skidelsky'A great achievement . . . Few books have shed better light on what Smith 'meant' and why he wrote as he did . . . it also sets out a richly informed account of the intellectual life in Scotland, London And The Continent at the time' Bill Jamieson, Scotland on Sunday 'Shows Smith was not the apostle of selfishness he is often misunderstood to be . . . Phillipson has portrayed an Adam Smith for our times' Diane Coyle, New Statesman