William James: Selected Unpublished Correspondence, 1885-1910

Judiciously chosen to reflect both James's professional interests in science, psychology, psychical research and philosophy, and his eminent place among intellectuals of his day, these letters from the last 25 years of his life satisfyingly round out our portrait of him as thinker and man. Never dry, though often touching on intellectual controversy or expressing James's own philosophical views ("" `pragmatism' never meant for me more than a method of conducting discussions''), the letters strikingly exhibit his generosity toward other thinkers, his role of peacemaker in Harvard politics and his warmth of character, particularly evident in his many letters to Ferdinand Schiller, a young English friend and disciple. They also show him capable on occasion of sharp candor. ``Your mysticism article,'' he tells a prickly German philosopher, ``seems to me a monumentally foolish performance.'' Scott is a professor of psychology at San Jose State University in California. (July 1)