SOURCE: “Bad Behavior,” in New York Review of Books, July 20, 1989, pp. 11–13.

In the following review, Williams dismisses Intellectuals as a “useless” enterprise and suggests more fruitful questions that Johnson might have pursued instead.

Paul Johnson is a prolific British writer who has produced histories of the Jews, Christianity, the modern world, and the English people. He is, I believe, a Catholic (if so, it commendably did not discourage him, in his substantial and very readable history of Christianity, from admitting that the religion, to all intents and purposes, was founded by Saint Paul). Between 1955 and 1970 he worked on the left-wing journal The New Statesman, and for six years was its editor, with more success than anyone has achieved since. He is now firmly entrenched on the right, and is a fierce critic of left intellectuals.

The background to his new book [Intellectuals] is the rise and influence of...