Fire and Ashes Paperback by Michael Ignatieff

Product Details

• Publisher: Vintage Canada (2015-04-07)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 224 pages
• ISBN-13: 9780345813275
• Item Weight: 209.79 grams
• Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.61 cm

Renowned author and former Liberal Party of Canada leader Michael Ignatieff delivers a stirring meditation on contemporary politics and the lessons he learned in defeat. Candid and utterly unexpected, this book is not just for Canadians concerned about the future of the Liberal Party, but for all citizens concerned about the future of Canada and of political discourse in today's increasingly partisan world.

     In 2011, the "Natural Governing Party of Canada" suffered its greatest defeat when Stephen Harper's Conservatives won a majority and Jack Layton's NDP superseded the Liberals to form the Official Opposition. It has spawned a time of soul-searching for the Liberal Party and its former leader, Michael Ignatieff—but while the party continues to look for answers, Ignatieff has found his in Fire and Ashes: the reasons why he went into politics in the first place. In what he says is the most difficult book he's ever written, Ignatieff (the son of a Canadian diplomat whose reputation was made long before he risked it all in politics) explores what it is to be a citizen and why, even in today's adversarial climate, the aspirations of the political life can still outweigh the costs.

About the Author

MICHAEL IGNATIEFF is the author of Isaiah Berlin and The Warrior's Honour, as well as sixteen other acclaimed books, including a memoir, The Russian Album and the Booker finalist Scar Tissue. He writes regularly for the New York Times, the New York Review of Books, and the London Review of Books, and has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including Fresh Air and Fareed Zakariah GPS. Former head of Canada's Liberal Party and director of the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard's Kennedy School, he is currently the president of Central European University in Budapest.