Despite major political disagreements I have with the author, Michael Harrington has penned a formidable and well-researched review of the origins, history, and conteporary tendencies of "socialism." He succesfully demysitifes the hazy origins of socialist thought by reaching back into ancient history and fleshing out the socialist undertones of messianic christianity, the hopelessly romantic continental "utopians", and the turbulent and often violent uprisings that seemed nearly irrational or without cause to the petty philosopher, pacifist, or the politically inactive observer. In the book he chronicled European revolutions, and Asian revolutions, and American revolts and passed them through with a fine-toothed comb brushing away all the remnants of "false-consciousness". Michael Harrington was an important part of the American Socialist movement and will not be easily forgotten.