SOURCE: Welch, Colin. Review of On Looking into the Abyss, by Gertrude Himmelfarb. National Review 46, no. 7 (18 April 1994): 48.

In the following review, Welch offers high praise for On Looking into the Abyss, calling it a splendid book of formidable erudition and wide scope.

Fortunate he who, peering apprehensively into the dread Abyss, finds beside him, peering too and holding his hand, the intrepid, benign, and reassuring figure of Professor Himmelfarb. What better guide and comrade could he have? Who better to accompany him into this horrible place?

Some years ago I reviewed a previous book by Professor Himmelfarb. We'd known her here in London, where her husband, Irving Kristol, edited the magazine Encounter, of blessed memory. She was and is affectionately known as Bea, less of a mouthful than Professor Himmelfarb. May I use this pet-name? My review turned irresistibly into a paean of praise for Bea, of admiration...