The Politics of Truth: Selected Writings of C. Wright Mills

“Choosing from a plethora of Mills’s publications is no easy task. Summers has handled this chore wisely, rejecting a handy potpourri in favor of concentrating on what Mills had to say about a particular problem: the role intellectuals should play in contemporary society.” —The New Republic

“John Summers, who has been working with the Mills legacy for years, has done us the large service of collecting in The Politics of Truth many essays, lectures, and sketches. Summers provides an ample biographical sketch of Mills as well as a first-rate representative selection of his occasional writing.” —The Nation

“The essays in this anthology have much to tell us about the way knowledge becomes the handmaiden of social desires and social corruption. There isn’t a false note in the bunch and a small number approximate genius.” —The American Conservative

“A forward-looking Mills revival needs to re-engage with his original writings, and for this we have John H. Summers’s splendid new collection of Mills’s essays, interviews, speeches, and public lectures. Summers has produced an engaging volume. Mills describes a world in which the average person has become dreadfully complacent and is only too willing to let a few powerful politicians make the decisions that affect their lives.” —Sociology