''The Revolt of the Masses'' ( es, La rebelión de las masas, ) is a book by

José Ortega y Gasset José Ortega y Gasset (; 9 May 1883 – 18 October 1955) was a Spanish philosopher and essayist. He worked during the first half of the 20th century, while Spain oscillated between monarchy, republicanism, and dictatorship. His philosoph ...

. It was first published as a series of articles in the newspaper '' El Sol'' in 1929, and as a book in 1930; the English translation, first published two years later, was authorized by Ortega. While the published version notes that the translator asked to remain anonymous, more recent editions also record that its US copyright was renewed in 1960 by a Teresa Carey, and the

US Copyright Office The United States Copyright Office (USCO), a part of the Library of Congress, is a United States government body that maintains records of copyright registration, including a copyright catalog. It is used by copyright title searchers who are ...

's published list of US copyright renewals for January 1960 gives the translator as J. R. Carey. A second translation was published in 1985 by the University of Notre Dame Press in association with W. W. Norton & Co. This translation was completed by Anthony Kerrigan (translator) and Kenneth Moore (editor). An introduction was written by novelist Saul Bellow.

Summary

In this work, Ortega traces the genesis of the "mass-man" and analyzes his constitution, ''en route'' to describing the rise to power and action of the masses in society. Ortega is throughout quite critical of both the masses and the mass-men of which they are made up, contrasting "noble life and common life" and excoriating the barbarism and primitivism he sees in the mass-man. He does not, however, refer to specific social classes, as has been so commonly misunderstood in the English-speaking world. Ortega states that the mass-man could be from any social background, but his specific target is the

bourgeois The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. They ...

educated man, the ''señorito satisfecho'' (satisfied young man, or Mr. Satisfied), the specialist who believes he has it all and extends the command he has of his subject to others, contemptuous of his ignorance in all of them. Ortega's summary of what he attempted in the book exemplifies this quite well, while simultaneously providing the author's own views on his work: "In this essay an attempt has been made to sketch a certain type of European, mainly by analyzing his behaviour as regards the very civilization into which he was born". This had to be done because that individual "does not represent a new civilisation struggling with a previous one, but a mere negation ..."

Notable quotes

References

* Pedro Blas Gonzalez
''Ortega's 'The Revolt of the Masses' and the Triumph of the New Man''
Algora Publishing, 2007.

External links

Ortega y Gasset's Revolt of the Masses (excerpt)

* ttp://pinkmonkey.com/dl/library1/revolt.pdf Revolt of the Masses (PDF)
LA REBELIÓN DE LAS MASAS
{{DEFAULTSORT:Revolt of the Masses, The 1930 non-fiction books Books in political philosophy Contemporary philosophical literature Works by José Ortega y Gasset

Summary

Notable quotes

See also

References

External links