Roger Scruton (1944-2020) was a man of letters whose many books have been widely translated. His views often ran contrary to what he saw as dominant liberal-left political and academic opinion. He became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2003 and of the British Academy in 2008. In 2016 he was knighted for services to 'philosophy, teaching and public education'. In 2018 he was appointed Chair of the Government's Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission tasked with reforming planning law to make beauty an essential consideration.

A collection of provacative essays by the late philosopher and political thinker Roger Scruton. Each 'confession' reveals aspects of the author's thinking that his critics would probably have advised him to keep to himself. Scruton sought to answer the most pressing problems of our age: what can we do to protect Western values against Islamic extremism? Why is the Nation State worth preserving? How should we achieve a timely death against the advances of modern medicine? As Douglas Murray writes in his introduction, Scruton was an outsider, yet he showed his readers 'not just what they should reject, but what they should nurture and love.' This selection offers consolation and guidance to a new generation of readers.