TONY JUDT is a polymath. He was born in Britain into a family of Jewish refugees and now lives in America, where he teaches at New York University. He has an enviable grasp of European cultural history and a sharp and sometimes savage turn of phrase, both of which are well displayed in this collection of long essays and book reviews.
Mr Judt is at his best attacking those he believes mischaracterise or misunderstand intellectual giants like Arthur Koestler and Primo Levi. Myriam Anissimov's book on Levi, he says, is "uninspired and mechanical"; her narrative "a choppy mix of long excerpts" mixed up with "clunky and inadequate summaries of 'context'." Mr Judt sees Ms ...