Due to a passing in the family a few years ago and my subsequent health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for years after the bereavement. Thank you for the opportunity.

I was a bit slow downloading this, and it was unfortunately archived before I got a chance, so I bought a copy to review.

An interesting book. Well written and insightful. I enjoyed this.

Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher for approving my request, and apologies for not downloading.

This is something I will use whenever a student asks why they study RE. So many students don't see the connection between philosophy and their chosen career path; something this book makes very clear.

A book of vignettes a book of authors brief encounters with a group of interesting unusual people .told in short chapters spurts .Really enjoyed the glimpse Into this collection the author has gathered.Thanks #netgalley #spckpublishing,

Such an easy and pleasurable read. Interesting. Great subject matter. The book is split up into chapters and sections with various titles. Thank you to both NetGalley and SPCK publishing for my ARC . In exchange for my honest,unbiased review.

As well as writing roughly fifty, mostly philosophical, books, Anthony Kenny has also been, at various times, Master of Balliol College; Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University; Warden of Rhodes House and Secretary of the Rhodes Trust; a Delegate and member of the Finance Committee of the Oxford University Press; President of the British Academy; and Chair of the Board of the British Library. He is thus clearly an eminent member of ‘the great and the good’, which David Cannadine has defined as those “men and women of high intelligence and unassailable prestige, who dutifully serve on government committees and the boards of public bodies, and who bring to the conduct of business a disinterested tone of superior wisdom and high-minded worldliness.”

‘Brief Encounters’ records Kenny’s interactions with sixty distinguished individuals: a sort of global ‘great and good’ ranging from Isaiah Berlin to Noam Chomsky and from Graham Greene to Nelson Mandela.

These are arranged in groups of three, over twenty chapters, following an introductory chapter in which Kenny summarises his life, so that the reader can assess roughly when and how these encounters occurred, although anyone wanting more information on Kenny’s life can refer to his autobiographical volumes ‘A path from Rome’ (detailing his movement into and out of the Catholic priesthood) and ‘A Life in Oxford’.

The book has a certain amount of repetition and at least two typos (“died-in the-wool” and Ken Clarke being referred to as “Kenneth Clark”). In addition some may find the picture of overlapping networks which ‘Brief Encounters’ paints all a little too cosy, whilst its pen portraits instead of offering great insights tend merely to confirm one’s preconceptions – of Macmillan’s urbanity, Heath’s prickliness, and Thatcher’s imperious manner, for example.

On the other hand, the book does represent a pleasant and easy read, which in addition to shedding a little light on its subjects, provides some interesting reflections (did Balliol fail in its teaching of Boris Johnson?) as well as some good anecdotes, my favourite being the outrage expressed by Jeremy Irons when a depiction of the eleven ages of man was abruptly reduced to six because of the manifest boredom of the Chinese dignitaries for whom it was being staged.