Lionel Abel
SIDNEY HOOK'S CAREER
(THE PHILOSOPHER IN POLITICS)
In
the offices of
Partisan Review
-
as everyone knows by
now - the magazine's main writers were cut down regularly by Philip
Rahv, even though he had sought - and claimed credit for - their
contributions to it. There were those, of course, whom Rahv could
belittle without argument. But when Sidney Hook's name came up
for attack, Delmore Schwartz , if present - and he generally was–
would take Rahv on in his former teacher's defense. As I remember,
he once closed down a debate over Hook with this judgment: "He is
a great critical intelligence."
This is the right estimate of Hook's abilities, and I predict that
in time it will stir little dispute. The only reason some may question
it today is that Hook, a philosopher by training and talent, has shown
the power of his thinking mainly in politics. Political questions are
necessarily controversial, and there is nobody so gifted in controversy
as not to become himself the object of it. Politics means taking sides,
and one can hardly do this without making enemies. Hook has made
a goodly number of these, more than is normal- it is hardly to his
discredit - with philosophers.
I implied in what I said about Hook's efforts in politics that he
has not expressed himself as powerfully in philosophy. And such is
indeed the case. We do not read Hook to find new thoughts on the
great problems or interesting judgments of his predecessors or con–
temporaries. We do not read him for definitive judgments of Husserl,
Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Sartre, or even ofJohn Dewey, to whom he
devoted two books,
John Dewey, An Intellectual Portrait
and
John Dewey,
Philosopher of Science and Freedom.
But these works were efforts to bring
Dewey's thoughts to a wider audience; they were popularizations of
his leading ideas rather than discussions aimed at a careful testing of
their truth or importance . Dewey, Hook told us in
John Dewey, An
Intellectual Portrait,
is a philosopher for creators and producers, for
"the plain man." However unobjectionable as a political judgment of
Dewey's value to producers, creators, and plain men , this judgment
involves a certain disavowal of philosophy. Whatever one thinks of
"plain men" - my own taste would go towards men who might be called
"exquisite"-some still exist, in Europe, but also here, in America-
