Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell (1872 – 1970) was a philosopher, mathematician, historian, essayist, social critic, political activist, and Nobel laureate. Russell was a socialist and a pacifist, born in Monmouthshire into a prominent aristocratic family. When he was eleven years old, he read the work of Euclid, the Greek mathematician, and also the poet Shelley, of whom he wrote: “I spent all my spare time reading him, and learning him by heart, knowing no one to whom I could speak of what I thought or felt, I used to reflect how wonderful it would have been to know Shelley, and to wonder whether I should meet any live human being with whom I should feel so much sympathy”. By age fifteen, he came to the conclusion that there is no free will and, two years later, that there is no life after death. By eighteen he had become an atheist. In 1890 he won a scholarship to Cambridge and studied mathematics. He is widely held to be one of the 20th century’s premier logicians.  He was a prominent anti-war activist and he championed anti-imperialism. Although he went to prison for his pacifism during World War I Russell later concluded that war against Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany was a necessary “lesser of two evils”. He criticised the US’s involvement in Vietnam and was a campaigner for nuclear disarmament.  He transformed philosophy and can lay claim to being one of the greatest philosophers of all time. His views on religion, education, sex, politics and many other topics, made him one of the most read and revered writers of the age. He wrote over sixty books and published thousands of articles and is often regarded as one of the world’s most eminent thinkers.

Below is a selected bibliography of Russell’s books in English, sorted by year of first publication:

  • 1896. German Social Democracy. London: Longmans, Green.
  • 1897. An Essay on the Foundations of Geometry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • 1900. A Critical Exposition of the Philosophy of Leibniz. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • 1903. The Principles of Mathematics. Cambridge University Press.
  • 1903. A Free man’s worship, and other essays.
  • 1905. “On Denoting”, Mind, Vol. 14. Basil Blackwell
  • 1910. Philosophical Essays. London: Longmans, Green.
  • 1910–1913. Principia Mathematica (with Alfred North Whitehead). 3 vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • 1912. The Problems of Philosophy. London: Williams and Norgate.
  • 1914. Our Knowledge of the External World as a Field for Scientific Method in Philosophy. Chicago and London: Open Court Publishing.
  • 1916. Principles of Social Reconstruction. London, George Allen and Unwin.
  • 1916. Why Men Fight. New York: The Century Co.
  • 1916. The Policy of the Entente, 1904–1914 : a reply to Professor Gilbert Murray. Manchester: The National Labour Press
  • 1916. Justice in War-time. Chicago: Open Court.
  • 1917. Political Ideals. New York: The Century Co.
  • 1918. Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1918. Proposed Roads to Freedom: Socialism, Anarchism, and Syndicalism. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1919. Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1920. The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1921. The Analysis of Mind. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1922. The Problem of China. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1922. Free Thought and Official Propaganda, delivered at South Place Institute
  • 1923. The Prospects of Industrial Civilization, in collaboration with Dora Russell. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1923. The ABC of Atoms, London: Kegan Paul. Trench, Trubner.
  • 1923. Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1924. Icarus; or, The Future of Science. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.
  • 1925. The ABC of Relativity. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.
  • 1925. What I Believe. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.
  • 1926. On Education, Especially in Early Childhood. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1927. The Analysis of Matter. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.
  • 1927. An Outline of Philosophy. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1927. Why I Am Not a Christian. London: Watts.
  • 1927. Selected Papers of Bertrand Russell. New York: Modern Library.
  • 1928. Sceptical Essays. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1929. Marriage and Morals. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1930. The Conquest of Happiness. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1931. The Scientific Outlook, London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1932. Education and the Social Order, London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1934. Freedom and Organization, 1814–1914. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1935. In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1935. Religion and Science. London: Thornton Butterworth.
  • 1936. Which Way to Peace?. London: Jonathan Cape.
  • 1937. The Amberley Papers: The Letters and Diaries of Lord and Lady Amberley, with Patricia Russell, 2 vols., London: Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press.
  • 1938. Power: A New Social Analysis. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1940. An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
  • 1945. The Bomb and Civilisation. Published in the Glasgow Forward on August 18, 1945.
  • 1945. A History of Western Philosophy and Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present Day New York: Simon and Schuster.
  • 1949. Authority and the Individual. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1950. Unpopular Essays. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1951. New Hopes for a Changing World. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1952. The Impact of Science on Society. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1953. Satan in the Suburbs and Other Stories. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1954. Human Society in Ethics and Politics. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1954. Nightmares of Eminent Persons and Other Stories. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1956. Portraits from Memory and Other Essays. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1956. Logic and Knowledge: Essays 1901–1950, edited by Robert C. Marsh. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1957. Why I Am Not A Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects, edited by Paul Edwards. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1958. Understanding History and Other Essays. New York: Philosophical Library.
  • 1959. Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1959. My Philosophical Development. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1959. Wisdom of the West, edited by Paul Foulkes. London: Macdonald.
  • 1960. Bertrand Russell Speaks His Mind, Cleveland and New York: World Publishing Company.
  • 1961. The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, edited by R. E. Egner and L. E. Denonn. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1961. Fact and Fiction. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1961. Has Man a Future? London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1963. Essays in Skepticism. New York: Philosophical Library.
  • 1963. Unarmed Victory. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1965. Legitimacy Versus Industrialism, 1814–1848. London: George Allen & Unwin (first published as Parts I and II of Freedom and Organization, 1814–1914, 1934).
  • 1965. On the Philosophy of Science, edited by Charles A. Fritz, Jr. Indianapolis: The Bobbs–Merrill Company.
  • 1966. The ABC of Relativity. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1967. Russell’s Peace Appeals, edited by Tsutomu Makino and Kazuteru Hitaka. Japan: Eichosha’s New Current Books.
  • 1967. War Crimes in Vietnam. London: George Allen & Unwin.
  • 1951–1969. The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 3 vols., London: George Allen & Unwin. Vol. 2, 1956
  • 1969. Dear Bertrand Russell… A Selection of his Correspondence with the General Public 1950–1968, edited by Barry Feinberg and Ronald Kasrils. London: George Allen and Unwin.

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