ABSTRACT

Behind the close reading of seventeenth-century English radical theology, eighteenth-century French Enlightenment scientism, and nineteenth-century German philosophies of history is the story of that experience that Melvin J. Lasky was closest to in his own background: the Second World War and postwar reconstruction in the mid-twentieth century. The end of the Cold War signaled the collapse of the Soviet Empire but hardly of the communist idea and its practices beyond the pale of Europe. It was a collapse that Lasky celebrated in his own way by calling a conference in Berlin in 1992 on "Last Encounter with the Cold War". Without a doubt, the most painful aspect of Melvin Lasky's career is his association, and that of Encounter magazine, with The Congress of Cultural Freedom. This major global agency based in Paris and dedicated to the freedom of intellect in the arts and sciences enlisted Lasky's deepest passions.