Robert Bellah (1927–2013) was one of the most influential social scientists of the twentieth century. Trained as a sociologist, he crossed disciplinary boundaries in pursuit of a greater comprehension of religion as both a cultural phenomenon and a way to fathom the depths of the human condition. A Joyfully Serious Man is the definitive biography of this towering figure in modern intellectual life, and a revelatory portrait of a man who led an adventurous yet turbulent life.
Drawing on Bellah’s personal papers as well as in-depth interviews with those who knew him, Matteo Bortolini tells the story of an extraordinary scholarly career and an eventful and tempestuous life. He describes Bellah’s exile from the United States during the hysteria of the McCarthy years, his crushing personal tragedies, and his experiments with sexuality. Bellah understood religion as a mysterious human institution that brings together the scattered pieces of individual and collective experiences. Bortolini shows how Bellah championed intellectual openness and innovation through his relentless opposition to any notion of secularization as a decline of religion and his ideas about the enduring tensions between individualism and community in American society.
Based on nearly two decades of research, A Joyfully Serious Man is a revelatory chronicle of a leading public intellectual who was both a transformative thinker and a restless, passionate seeker.
Awards and Recognition
- Winner of the History of Sociology and Social Thought Book Award, American Sociological Association
"Bortolini's weaving of biography with the interpretation of a lifetime's intellectual labor into a narrative culminates in a picture of Bellah that brings together large‐scale themes with telling detail both familiar and unfamiliar ... [this] terrific book is likely to be the first one to which scholars turn for a rich examination of Bellah's life for a very long time."—Susan E. Henking, Journal of the History of Behavioral Sciences
"Bortolini has produced what one imagines will prove to be a matchless achievement."—Bryan S. Turner, Journal of Classical Sociology
"Matteo Bortolini has written the definitive biography of the American sociologist Robert Neelly Bellah."—Chad Alan Goldberg, Civic Sociology
"Bortolini weaves the strands together effortlessly. Personal loss, friendship, love, and grief are neither afterthoughts nor drivers of this narrative of a life. Rather we come to appreciate how the life and the mind worked together—sometimes in conflict, sometimes in sync. In a standard intellectual biography, life is often the background for thought. In this book, there is no distinction between them."—Joan Scott, Civic Sociology
"Robert Neely Bellah makes an excellent subject for a biography, and Matteo Bortolini has written a fascinating biography of him that illuminates his life, his work, and his times all at once."—Philip Gorski, The Hedgehog Review
"Bortolini's terrific book is likely to be the first one to which scholars turn for a rich examination of Bellah's life for a very long time."—Susan E. Henking, Journal of the History of Behavioral Sciences
“This is a splendid book. Rarely have I seen a biography that so adeptly blends personal, intellectual, and social history so flawlessly. Robert Bellah’s contributions to the study of religion were, and remain, revolutionary, and I still find myself using methods and approaches I learned from him. In reading this riveting book, I felt we were back together, and was grateful.”—Harvey Cox, author of The Future of Faith
“A deeply humane, gracefully written portrayal of one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century, Matteo Bortolini’s A Joyfully Serious Man channels Robert Bellah’s unique voice, offering readers an intimate portrait of his personal and professional journeys, a careful exegesis of his ideas, and a richly textured analysis of the contexts of all three. Bellah could not have found a better biographer. A stunning achievement.”—Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen, author of The Ideas That Made America: A Brief History
“An excellent biography. Bortolini has produced not only a rich and original account of the evolution of Bellah’s thought, but also a picture of Bellah the man, tormented by relentless inner strivings, frustrated desires, and unfathomable loss, all set against the backdrop of the social, cultural, and religious history of his day.”—Neil Gross, author of Why Are Professors Liberal and Why Do Conservatives Care?
“A Joyfully Serious Man is a singular book. In Bortolini’s hands, Robert Bellah becomes a prism that filters the light of his time, and sends it back to the reader as a history of American culture in the latter half of the twentieth century. But the book also succeeds as an intimate portrait: we feel we know this man, with all his idiosyncrasies, feelings of emptiness, longings, ambitions, sense of gratitude, enormous curiosity, and brilliant accomplishments.”—Jeffrey C. Alexander, author of What Makes a Social Crisis? The Societalization of Social Problems
