6 FEBRUARY 1971, Page 6

The higher humbug

We print in our Review of Books two dis- cussions of Chomsky and his works. What seems to emerge is that not only has Chomsky's politics nothing to do with his undoubted linguistic achievements; but also • that his general philosophisings have nothing very much to do with them either. In short, Noam Chomsky is a distinguished American scholar who is making a second career for himself in the higher-thought business. At this, which is the show business of the academic world, he is quite good, though not, I think, very original. I am always grateful for Chomsky's (or anyone else's) demolition of the Schlesinger-Galbraith higher hum- bug, but I suspect that between their higher humbug and his own there lies only the generation gap.