Rethinking Mill's Ethics

Discussion of John Stuart Mill's ethics has been dominated by concern with right and wrong action as determined by the principle of utility. Colin Heydt's book unearths the rich context of moral and socio-political debate that Mill did not have to make explicit to his Victorian readers, in order to enrich the philosophical analysis of his ethics and to show a famous and misunderstood moralist in a new light.

"'Colin Heydt's work is a rich and original contextual study of John Stuart Mill's political philosophy, ethics and moral psychology. Heydt has a keen eye for the aesthetic dimensions of Mill's ideas of character and moral education and this has led to a great deal of clarification of Mill's more well-known moral ideas. It has also enabled Heydt to situate Mill more interestingly than is common in the context of predecessors and contemporaries, crossing many of the traditional disciplinary boundaries.' Knud Haakonssen, University of Sussex 'Colin Heydt's investigation of Mill is an original, engaging, and illuminating study of unduly neglected aspects of Mill's thought. I learned a great deal from it - not only about Mill and his views but also about aesthetic education and character development.' David Lyons, Boston University"

Colin Heydt is Assistant Professor in Philosophy at the University of South Florida. Among his other publications is Narrative, Imagination, and the Religion of Humanity in Mill's Ethics, Journal of the History of Philosophy.