Copying the coyote
Richard Poirier, 18 October 1984
The Principles of Psychology
by William James, introduced by George Miller.
Harvard, 1302 pp., £14.95, December 1983,0 674 70625 0 Show More
by William James, introduced by George Miller.
Harvard, 1302 pp., £14.95, December 1983,
A Stroll with William James
by Jacques Barzun.
Chicago, 344 pp., £16, October 1983,0 226 03865 3 Show More
by Jacques Barzun.
Chicago, 344 pp., £16, October 1983,
Becoming William James
by Howard Feinstein.
Cornell, 377 pp., $24.95, May 1984,0 8014 1617 5 Show More
by Howard Feinstein.
Cornell, 377 pp., $24.95, May 1984,
Essays in Psychology
by William James, edited by Frederick Burkhardt and Fredson Bowers.
Harvard, 467 pp., £32, April 1984,0 674 26714 1 Show More
by William James, edited by Frederick Burkhardt and Fredson Bowers.
Harvard, 467 pp., £32, April 1984,
“... When, in the summer of 1898, at the age of 56, William James went to Berkeley, California to deliver a series of lectures on pragmatism, he could have used his own life to illustrate the immensely difficult but successful application of one of its tenets: that truth is best seen as ‘what it is better for us to believe’, not as ‘as an accurate representation of reality’, and that what is better for us to believe is what can be ascertained only in and through our actions, not by consultation with fixed ideas or traditions or, notably in his case, by family example ... ”