Rating: 
Summary: A Great Book for the two-year-old mentality
Review: This is a book by a chronic kicker, someone who frequently cites Emile Zola but who has all the relevance of "a young contrarian" wallowing in what is otherwise known as the terrible twos.
Don't get me wrong: Hitchens is very self-important, his targets range from President Clinton to Mother Teresa, which earned him an interview with Vatican authorities in a "closed room, a Bible, a tape-recorder, a Monsignor, a Deacon and a Father." He spent years attacking Clinton, and was finally thrilled when someone noted his piffle. But, this molehill of courage doesn't write a word in this book about President Geoge Bush.
He says it's courageous and vital to dissent. Nice. Welcome to an idea that has been celebrated since John Milton and the First Amendmant to the US Constitution. To guard his own brilliance, he doesn't cite a single example of the how, when, where, why and what of anyone he's criticized. His book is supposed to be "the art of mentoring," but he limits it to praise of his own courage, insight, wit and relevance.
Granted, Hitchens is a rare talent; his unique ability is being outrageous without being effective. He doesn't cite a single example of his dissonance doing diddly squat. He offers feel-good whines, moans and complaints, but nothing constructive. It's why late-night TV talk show monologues are the epitome of today's political commentary, humour, satire and relevance.
He consistently attacks political compromise, praising "fanatics and absolutists like John Brown, who regarded compromise as a disgrace." So -- was Abraham Lincoln a second-rate president compared to a John Brown? This reflects the great weakness of this book: Hitchens doesn't understand the difference between dissent and dissonance.
There's a good reason why Hitchens is inconsequential compared to dissent such as Zola, Vaclav Havel and even Tom Lehrer -- this rant is always safe, tame and respectable. It's a perfect Hallowe'en gift, a fierce rubbery face meant to produce a shriek, a laugh and a comment, "Oh, how clever!" It's great sport for the two-year-old mentality.
"Most people, most of the time, prefer to seek approval or security," Hitchens writes. This is his meagre attempt at respectability; he does so by citing great dissenters and basking in their reflected courage, glory and relevance. He falls far short of being a court jester, lacking the wit, wisdom, wiles and wariness to be relevant.
Sadly, but not unexpectedly, he misses the mark.
Rating: 
Summary: Christopher Hitchens describes his principles
Review: "Letters To A Contrarian" is really a book of letter Hitchins writes to himself about, primarily, how to maintain his radical values. It is really a book about who Christopher is. His books are perhaps the most interesting and original books (who else would vilify Mother Theresa and Henry Kissinger?) written on current history and politics; yet the most irrelevant too. Hitchens is extremely bright (even in an extremely bright profession) , controversial, radical, iconoclastic, educated, experienced, and still astonishingly irrelevant. One time he is taking on Mother Teresa, then appearing as a leftist on C-SPAN against his conservative British brother, then he turns up on Charlie Rose saying he is a libertarian, then he writes regularly for The Nation (while preferring globalization), and finally he applauds an article in the National Review or the Weekly Standard. This latest book is the most scattered of all amounting to little more than a general pep talk about how to keep up your radical credentials (don't follow the crowd, etc.), or, how to be Christopher Hitchens. Being so independent, cool, intellectual, and affected (unshaven, trench coat, chain smoking, intellectual verbal cadence) may be good for ones' image and career but how does it really help the reader who time and again is given only the choice of voting for a Democrat or Republican?
In the beginning there was Thomas Jefferson arguing for freedom and Alexander Hamilton arguing for Government. Today the Democrats and Republicans are still arguing about the same issue, while Mr. Hitchens is oddly arguing about something else not even defined, let alone on the ballot? Why doesn't he write a book on why Trent Lott and Sam Daschel have split the United States gov't along stupid or irrelevant lines? Why doesn't he address the issue every American faces every time he enters a voting booth? In truth, the more relevant and central an issue is to World History the more Mr. Hitchens stays away from it. So, if you want to be a proud but harmless radical, read this book. But, please consider that when you are done, like Marlon Brando in "The Wild Ones" you'll still have to figure out what it is that you want to be radical about, if that should matter to you at all. The scattershot Hitchins/Brando approach is just not relevant to the choice voters face. The non-intellectual mass media keeps America divided and in the middle because that is how the they make the most money and find the biggest audience while the very intellectual Christopher Hitchens does the same thing because that is how he too makes the most money. Or, perhaps in an existential world "cool and independent" has a value all by itself? But, if you want to read a book that seeks to be relevant as much as this book seeks to avoid relevancy try "Understanding The Difference Between Democrats And Republicans"
Rating:
Summary: Pomo Guru?
Review: At the risk of sounding like an overly exuberant Teen meeting Justin Timberlake for the first time-let me say I love this book. While I might not entirely agree with him philosophically, and while he may border on insufferableness at points in the book(too much name dropping), it was, and remains an excellent read. It's really an antithesis to self help society and the idea that internal angst should be stifled and isn't healthy. Living in the bay area, the exhippy/pseudo zen capital of the world, where everyone is enlightened and drives an SUV to yoga,and is never really upest by anything because that would be indicative of a need for more paxil and meditation,(unless it's some sort of low income housing development going in, or a large sign being placed next to the freeway), this book especially spoke to me. At it's core is the conviction that conflict has to happen for any sort of clarity. Which, given our saccharine and often times numbing pop culture-is revolutionary in and of itself. He's not preaching nihilism, just the embrace of irony-and unlike many other pomo philiosophers that I've read, he seems cautiously optimistic about the future and human beings. Again, I disagree with him on several points, but this book has to be apprecciated for it's refusal to accept lackisdasical intellectualism no matter what side of the spectrum it comes from and for encouraging people to think for themselves, in meaningful ways. He may be an elitist, but so what?
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent... Entertaining
Review: Christopher Hitchens is often wonderful to listen to, while at other times he can be aggravating. But he presents his opinions directly, honestly, and intellectually, and this makes him entertaining... always. In this short book, Hitchens gives his thoughts on what it means to be contrarian. He advises his audience on why it is often important to stand contrary to the mainstream, and he gives numerous examples to support this argument. Hitchens' writing is witty, and all readers will find several areas of agreement and disagreement with the author, but whatever the degree to which one agrees with Hitchens, it is impossible to argue that he is not thought-provoking. Several reviewers here believe Hitchens to be contrarian simply for the sake of being contrarian, but this is not the case, and he actually cautions the reader several times not to be contrarian simply for argumentitive reasons. Hitchens follows his own advice, and this is best demonstrated in his discussions of religion. Despite the oft-cited polls (another item Hitchens lambastes), most people in our secular modern world do not truly believe in any religion. Many will say they are members of a certain religion, but the slightest interrogation never ceases to fail in demonstrating that very few have more than a shallow understanding of what their respective religious books have to say. Instead, in today's world, all religions are usually twisted and distorted into something that is convenient or much easier to believe. So in his disbelief and general distrust of all (not just Christianity) religions, Hitchens is not contrarian. What is contrarian though, is his refusal to make apologies for this stance. Christopher Hitchens does not take several religions and pick and choose the parts he likes (as does the Hollywood crowd), he does not make some lame explanation about being "spiritual, not religious", he does not claim to be "...still a Christian, though", nor does he take the religion in which he was raised and distort it (i.e. the "that one is just a story... oh, but that one there actually happened..." defense). Quite simply, and very easily, he dismisses them all, and defenestrates respect for their leaders as well. And THAT is contrarian. I highly recommend this book, even though it comes from an author with whom I have multiple disagreements. It is a quick read, but it is thought-provoking and encouraging. Above all, any honest reader will appreciate Hitchens' refusal to make excuses for popular figures such as the Dalai Lama and Bill Clinton.
Rating: 
Summary: Contrary to Popular Belief
Review: Christopher Hitchens politics are often annoying--and occasionally bizarre--and his personality can be grating, to say the least. But man, can he write. He's a great thinker, no doubt about it. Unfortunately, his incredible brain has been turned off onto some weird side road, filled with illogical conspiracy theories, debunct claims, and unfounded, illogical, and slanderous accusations. His incredible mind has often been wasted forming a proposterous universe that simply doesn't exist. When he keeps himself on the plane of reality, he's a fascinating genius. He's been everywhere and done everything--though he seems to spend all of his time with crackpots and political hucksters--and he can tell a hell of a story. This is a fascinating book, when it steers clear of calling Mother Teresa names or referring to idiotic plots by Kissenger and Ghandi. Of course, one of the signs of Hitchens crackpot-genius is the fact that he has innoculated himself against criticisms like mine: I'm just a brainwashed victim of the worldwide conspiracy...
Rating:
Summary: The art of intellectual war
Review: Christopher Hitchens slouches handsomely on the cover of this book, holding a cigarette, the new millenium's chosen death's head, or memento mori. This prop is no accident. In "Letters to a Young Contrarian", Hitchens usefully and repeatedly emphasizes the humanity of those political, literary or scientific rebels with great causes, noting that heroism can and does emerge from flesh and blood bodies. Bodies which are beaten, which suffer, which are killed, for the opposition immured in their minds to what is known to be morally or ethically wrong. Contrariwise, he enjoins the reader to: "Picture all experts as if they were mammals." The humanity of the leader, of the expert, connects him to his audience to a subversive degree. This is a peculiar form of humanism: one which is unsentimental, while deeply concerned for justice. As Hitchens observes, if we cannot behave all that much better as human beings, we can certainly always behave much worse. Hitchens enjoins against cynicism and idealism in the same breath. His instructions may seem contradictory, which is largely the point. He rejects all "-isms" from Marxism to monarchism, after having wildly but happily feasted upon them. Hitchens has made a career of knowing his enemies, from Kissinger to Clinton. Still, though the absurdity of life and of democratic politics is self-evident, Hitchens observes that the Absurd is a weapon of the intellectual, but never a valid excuse for inaction. Coming from such a formidable intellectual terrorist, the "Letters" are, predictibily, a comparatively slight work. "Slight" compared to other works in the Hitchens corpus, however, is no insult at all. After all, Hitchens's most recent work was a tight, concise indictment of Henry Kissinger as a war criminal, heavy on fact and minutely precise in detail. It is both important and bracing to have Hitchens state the obvious: that the dissenter will not be a popular fellow in his own lifetime, and can expect no thanks from any quarter for rejecting received opinions. Dissenters residing in the groupthink of academia are too often duped into thinking that challenging the status quo is a perfectly acceptable thing to do. It most certainly is not, and the rights of the intellectual often seem to end where the mind of the other fellow begins. Thought is exquisitely rare in contemporary culture, and largely frowned upon. Militant orthodoxies exist on both the right and left, and nuanced opinons are frequently pounced upon by both sides, and denounced as treasonous. Contrarianism of the Hitchens variety is not for the faint of heart. To counter the tyranny of consensus, Hitchens urges the reader to act "as if" it were perfectly possible to live in another, dignified manner; "as if" it were possible to be truthful and unafraid; "as if" one could be truly insightful and appreciated. The "as if" trope is the signal that none of these propositions is accurate, but each is possible. The consequences can be dire: Hitchens rhymes off the cases of Galileo, Oscar Wilde, Vaclav Havel, and Salman Rushdie to warn the intellectual combattant of the fates of some antecents. The stakes are obviously different in a first world democracy. "Any fool can lampoon a king or a bishop or a billionaire. A trifle more grit is required to face down a mob, or even a studio audience, that has decided it knows what it wants and is entitled to get it." Though Hitchens has elected to snub the British class system in favour of life in America, his Englishness, a source of pride and consternation alike, shines through the slim volume in his ease of reference in literature, politics and history. Sir Karl Popper is appealed to as a champion of the intellectual rough-housing for which Hitchens has made no secret of living. It is only though intellectual combat, notes Hitchens via Popper, that opponents learn and modify opinions in search of a final truth. Interestingly, Hitchens, who denounces wartime atrocities in his many writings, is no pacifist. The death of war would be death itself, an end of history if ever there was one. The existence of wartime atrocities does not imply the atrocity of war in itself, for Hitchens. One of life's thrilling ironies comes in Hitchens's annoucement, in the "Letters", that he has served in the believe-it-or-not official position of Devil's Advocate. Quite incredibly, Hitchens was invited to the Vatican hearings on the proposed sanctification of Mother Theresa, whom Hitchens had verbally bludgeoned for her political connections while the nun was still alive. (Interestingly, the position of Devil's Advocate had been officially abolished from the beatification process in 1983 by Pope John Paul II. Perhaps Hitchens resembled an intellectual Lucifer so closely that the Vatican thought to resurrect the position of "advocatus diaboli" for him alone.) This short aside recalls other Hitchens 'glory days'. He was afforded a rhetorical motherlode with the nearly simultaneous deaths of the Princess of Wales and Mother Theresa, permitting him to hop from one television program to another, to provide unkind obituaries of both subjects. Through Diana, Hitchens could attack the monarchy yet again; the death of Mother Theresa allowed him to restate his case against her, regarding her warm relations with the Duvaliers of the world. (Hitchens got even more mileage from the death of his Calcutta nemesis, when he wrote an uproarious piece for "Vanity Fair" about his new status as the official ghost-in-the-machine at other people's funerals.) Hitchens is clearly made shy by the awkward, high-concept proposition of walking in Rilke's footsteps, and elegantly downplays the invitation put before him by the publisher to lean heavily on the format of a literary masterpiece, "Letters to a Young Poet". The quick, ducking "Dear Reader" at the top of each segment pretty much sums up the concession Hitchens is prepared to make on this point. His infamous, devious wit is everywhere, however. A typical phrase: "I know that nothing is more tedious than the front-line recollections of a Sixties radical." Right on, man, as the soixante-huitards are wont to say. There are no sacred cows here, not even Hitchens himself. An exhortation aimed at the mind---a call to be better by trying harder intellectually, and by taking greater risks---is an exotic artifact in today's world. May it find an appreciative audience.
Rating:
Summary: letters to inform and instigate well concocted criticism
Review: christopher sets out to generate incentive to writers to critisize those in power or those held in high esteem--his forte. this book is very well written and i advise should be used in higher learning journalism classes
Rating:
Summary: A good start, but requiring more robust thinking to continue
Review: Dialectic is a form of dialogue in thought that exists as a transient life form, appearing and disappearing at various times in the cultural and philosophical ethos, usually coinciding with the threat of decline of a civilisation, or in its complacent self-assurance. Between the two, it has little function, and wanes as an intellectual force. Perhaps our times will arguably be defined as a mixture of both of these by the long view of history looking back, so it is appropriate that this little book should appear now and be written in the form of correspondence.
A young contrarian has little in common with the 'angry young man' perspective, although it must surely have its roots in the spirit of rebellion, which is associated wrongly with the stamp of youth. This is no text for the angry young man or woman. That, at best, is a starting point, revealing that the spirit of dissent is most probably hard-wired into us, and that it must be accommodated. By its existence, it guarantees the emergence of the critical spirit and the enquiring mind, and at the same time protects against the ossification of thought that can threaten these two. This hardening of thought turns into dogma and represents a calcification of spirit that reflects itself in a non-participative politik. Consequently, it cannot take a position and speak from on high, or pronounce truths, by which means it would become the very thing it judges or criticises. To write the main thrust of this book in the form of letters means that we readers are keyhole observers, peeping toms and no better than that, and this is a more advantageous position since one never feels preached to.
However, dialectical thought is not for the faint-hearted in that it never reaches a point of satisfaction. It is, after all, derived from a permanent state of dissatisfaction. But ironically, this book demonstrates what can happen when this dissent picks on soft targets and takes a position. It is, for instance, a simple task to be opposed to religious dogma and point at the wars of history fought in the defence of it, and it is just as easy to extol the virtues of science. Neither of these represent the dialectical position, since it would be the responsibility of the contrarian to take the opposite view of this and reverse this trend. Science, after all, has no serious critics, while religion is more or less permanently on the defensive. In effect, one feels that the task of the dialectician is being subverted to vent a personal view, which is not the purpose of dialectic. In this form it becomes all bombast and bluster and becomes rigidified, reflecting its transmutation and becoming the thing it should be opposed to.
However, any book that attempts to reactivate this important function at a time when the individual voice is becoming more and more scarce is worth looking at, for all its faults. There is much else in these few pages to commend it.
Rating:
Summary: Soul Searching by a Not-So-Young Contrarian
Review: First the reservations: This is part of the Art of Mentoring series, based on Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet. The idea is a good one but sometimes the format of the "letters" imposes a level of artifice that gets in the way of the content. Now the good news: Hitchens is the real deal. A man who has been critical of Mother Theresa and the Dahli Llama is clearly a man prepared to follow his own convictions. He is a courageous skeptic, not at all afraid to defend his educated opinion on a subject. His advice on being an independent thinker is good advice for everyone, not just "contrarians." In a time when voicing questions is regarded as unpatriotic, Hitchings reminds us of the importance of thinking the issues through. This book is an invitation to courageous thought and action. At the same time,Hitchens is not pontifical or bombastic. He is humorous and self-effacing throughout. This book is a quick read, but is thought-provoking and challenging as well. Not just for "contrarians" thinking people everywhere will find it invigorating.
Rating:
Summary: Soul Searching by a Not-So-Young Contrarian
Review: First the reservations: This is part of the Art of Mentoring series, based on Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet. The idea is a good one but sometimes the format of the "letters" imposes a level of artifice that gets in the way of the content. Now the good news: Hitchens is the real deal. A man who has been critical of Mother Theresa and the Dahli Llama is clearly a man prepared to follow his own convictions. He is a courageous skeptic, not at all afraid to defend his educated opinion on a subject. His advice on being an independent thinker is good advice for everyone, not just "contrarians." In a time when voicing questions is regarded as unpatriotic, Hitchings reminds us of the importance of thinking the issues through. This book is an invitation to courageous thought and action. At the same time,Hitchens is not pontifical or bombastic. He is humorous and self-effacing throughout. This book is a quick read, but is thought-provoking and challenging as well. Not just for "contrarians" thinking people everywhere will find it invigorating.
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