The Isaiah Berlin Catalogue

‘Isaiah Berlin on Music’, a compilation of all IB’s music criticism broadly defined, comprising the following (NB 'View document' below for PDF):

'Music Chronicle' - an online collection of the five articles published in Oxford Outlook 1930–2 under the pseudonym ‘Albert Alfred Apricott’ (‘A.A.A.’ except in the first case), 1930–2 (i.e. Bibs. 2b, 6, 7, 12, 13) with additional items (Bibs. 21(b), 19(c), 21(c), 23(c), 29)

• (1) Oxford Outlook 10 no. 53 (November 1930), 616–27 (see Bib.2(b)); (2) Oxford Outlook 11 no. 54 (March 1931), 49–53 (see Bib.6); (3) Oxford Outlook 11 no. 55 (June 1931), 131–5 (see Bib.7); (4) Oxford Outlook 12 no. 57 (February 1932), 61–5 (see Bib.12); (5) Oxford Outlook 12 no. 58 (May 1932), 133–8 (see Bib.13); Appendices – Concert Reviews in the Oxford Magazine (1) The Mass in D, 6 May 1937: OM 55 (1936–7), 558–9 (Bib.21(b)); (2) ‘Boyd Neel String Orchestra’, Oxford Magazine 55 (1936–7), 588–9 (Bib.19(c)); (3) (unattributed) ‘Toscanini’, Oxford Magazine 55 (1936–7), 719–20 (Bib.21c); (4) ‘Oxford Subscription Concert’, Oxford Magazine 56 (1937–8), 470–1 (Bib.23c); (5) ‘Karajan: A Study’, Observer, 19 September 1948, 2 (Bib.29)

‘Five Musical Books’ between 1934 and 1938 IB published five reviews of books on musical topics (Bibs. 16, 17, 18, 23b, 23)

• (1) Music in Decline, Review of Constant Lambert, Music Ho! A Study of Music in Decline (London, 1934: Faber), Spectator, 11 May 1934, 745–6 (Bib.16); (2) Review of Bernard van Dieren, Down Among the Dead Men and Other Essays (Oxford, 1935: Oxford University Press), Spectator, 1 November 1935, 732; see too letters, 22 November 1935, 874, 29 November 1935, 906 (Bib.17); (3) Review of Cecil Gray, Predicaments, or Music and the Future, Spectator, 21 August 1936, 317–18 (Bib.18); (4) Laws of Musical Sound, Review of Sir James Jeans, Science and Music (Cambridge, 1937: Cambridge University Press), London Mercury 37 no. 219 (January 1938), 356 (Bib.23(b)); (5) The Development of Modern Music, Review of Gerald Abraham, A Hundred Years of Music (London, [1938]: Duckworth), Spectator, 23 September 1938, 489–90 (Bib.23)

‘Gramophone Notes’ Record Reviews from the Oxford Magazine (OM), 1936–40 (Bibs. 18(a), 21(a), 23(a), 26(a), 46(a)): 'From 1936 to 1940 [...] Isaiah Berlin reviewed new record releases for the Oxford Magazine. These pieces form a substantial part of his writings on music – writings which may not be extensive, but are certainly significant, springing as they do from one of the deepest loves of his life, if not the deepest.' (Henry Hardy)

• (1) 13 February 1936: OM 54 (1935–6), 370; 5 March 1936: OM 54 (1935–6), 463–4; 18 June 1936: OM 54 (1935–6), 717; 19 November 1936: OM 55 (1936–7), 182 (Bib.18(a)); (2) 6 May, 1937: OM 55 (1936–7), 568 (Bib.21(a)); (3) 16 June 1938: OM 56 (1937–8), 770–1; 1 December 1938: OM 57 (1938–9), 243 (Bib.23(a)); (4) 9 May 1940: OM 58 (1939–40), 306–7 (Bib.26(a)); (5) Appendix: Lament for Lipatti, House and Garden 7 No 3 (March 1952), 91, 98 (Bib.46(a))

‘On Opera’, an online collection of musical notes previously published separately as:

• (1) ‘Don Giovanni at Aix-en-Provence’ (Bib.34(c)) (2) 'Mozart at Glyndebourne' (Bib.186); (3) 'Tchaikovsky and Eugene Onegin' (Bib.124); (4) 'Khovanshchina' (Bib.89); (5) 'Performances memorable — and not so memorable' (Bib.144); (6) 'Surtitles' (Bib.192(b) )

‘The Depth of Michael Tippett’, a contribution to Ian Kemp (ed.), Michael Tippett: A Symposium on his 60th Birthday (London, 1965: Faber), 62–3 (Bib.97)

See also: OA.1275(e) Sarah Collins, ‘Naivety, Liberalism, and Isaiah Berlin’s Musical Thinking’, 21 November 2024, 16 pp.

Minutes of the Oxford University Philosophical Society, 30 May 1937 to 5 June 1938

• Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, MS. Top. Oxon. e. 369/1, fols. 55r–57r, 63v–65r

 Minutes of the Jowett Society, Michaelmas Term 1930

• Oxford, Bodleian Libraries, MS. Top. Oxon. d. 391, fols. 105–8

View document, below, for PDF

(in Hebrew) Amir, Gal, ‘Berlin, Disraeli, al-Omar: The Nation State and Beyond’, Tarbut Democratit 21 (2023), 9–34

Bosetti, Giancarlo, ‘Isaiah Berlin: Monists and the Concoction of the Tragic Omelet’, in id., The Truth of Others: The Discovery of Pluralism in Ten Tales (Cham, 2023: Springer), 131–46

• includes an interview by Bosetti with Isaiah Berlin about Hamann
• view document (below) for the abstract - with additional notes by Henry Hardy, who applauds the quality of Bosetti's thought while being very critical of the publisher

Crowder, George, ‘Populism: A Berlinian Critique’, Society 60 (2023), 708–21

• published online 1 August 2023

Crowder, George, review of Edward Hall, Value, Conflict, and Order: Berlin, Hampshire, Williams, and the Realist Revival in Political Theory (Chicago, 2020: Chicago University Press), Society 60 (2023), 1061–6

• published online 2 October 2023

Della Casa, Alessandro, ‘Isaiah Berlin, l’orientalismo e il pluralismo’, Rivista di filosofia 2023 No. 2 (August), 305–27

• Follow link in title, or view document below, for an abstract (in English)

Hama, Shinichiro, ‘Modus Vivendi’, in Mortimer Sellers and Stephan Kirste (eds), Encyclopedia of the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy (Dordrecht, 2023: Springer)

Ignatieff, Michael, ‘Isaiah Berlin and the Promise of Freedom’ [19 July 2023], Prospect, August/September 2023

Li, Renzhi, ‘An Unrealised Project? Isaiah Berlin and the Philosophy of History’, History of European Ideas 49 No 7 (2023), 1161–78

• published online 27 January 2023

Moyne, Samuel, ‘Hannah Arendt among the Cold War Liberals’, Journal of the History of Ideas 84 No. 3 (July 2023), 533–58

• See also Moyne's 2022 Carlyle Lectures at the University of Oxford, the second of which, 'The Romantic Revolution', focuses on Isaiah Berlin

Tan, Christine Abigail L. ‘ “Freedom In”: A Daoist Response to Isaiah Berlin’, Dao 22 (March 2023), 255–75 (22 March 2023, online)

Bachega, Leandro, Isaiah Berlin: pluralismo e dois conceitos de liberdade [Isaiah Berlin: Pluralism and Two Concepts of Liberty] (São Paulo, 2023: É Realizações)

Spisiak, Brian Daniel, ‘Isaiah Berlin’s Liberal Humanism’, Ph.D. thesis, Department of Political Science, Duke University, 2023

Crowder, George, ‘Isaiah Berlin and International Relations’, The European Legacy: Toward New Paradigms 29 (2024) no. 1, 1–21

• published online 2 February 2024

Della Casa, Alessandro, ‘Isaiah Berlin e i limiti del pluralismo’ [‘Isaiah Berlin and the Limits of Pluralism’], Paradoxa 3 (2024), 93–103

• Article in Italian, but for an abstract in English view document (below)

Isaiah Berlin and the Aesthetics of Liberalism

The six contributions to this forum are appearing online in the journal Modern Intellectual History before they appear in print.

   (a) Cherniss, Joshua L., and Collins, Sarah, ‘Introduction: An Aesthetic Approach to Intellectual History? Isaiah Berlin and the Ethos of Liberalism’, 2 December 2024, 14 pp.

   (b) Cherniss, Joshua L., ‘Aestheticizing Heroism for an Aesthetic Liberalism: Isaiah Berlin on Heroes and Hero Worship’, forthcoming

   (c) Steinmetz, Alicia, ‘Isaiah Berlin’s Liberal Reformation’, 9 December 2024, 22 pp.

   (d) Smith, Steven, ‘Isaiah Berlin and the Aesthetics of Judgment’, 27 November 2024, 18 pp.

   (e) Collins, Sarah, ‘Naivety, Liberalism, and Isaiah Berlin’s Musical Thinking’, 21 November 2024, 16 pp.

   (f) Ferrell, Jason, ‘Metaphor as Method in the Writings of Isaiah Berlin’, 2 December 2024, 20 pp.

Steinmetz, Alicia, ‘Isaiah Berlin’s Liberal Reformation’, 9 December 2024, 22 pp.

Bi Xiao, ‘Integrating “Riga” into the “World”: Isaiah Berlin’s Study of Russian Culture’, Russian Literature and Arts 2024 no. 3, 21–31

• This work is in Chinese