This account of one man s search for truth bears witness to defection and apostasy and, in the end, to the humility of deeply lived experience.Eliseo Vivas, distinguished teacher, literary critic, and philosopher, relates the search by his alter ego, Alonzo Quijano, for a philosophy to live by as well as one to think well by. His intellectual odyssey is marked by defection from communism and apostasy from the philosophy of John Dewey.Vivas provides throughout this account of Alonzo s rupture with his commitments an analysis of the ideas of the major philosophic thinkers of the Western world, an analysis which first moves toward partial acceptance but which ends with their rejection. He devotes the final chapters to the views on politics and moral, theological, and aesthetic subjects at which Alonzo arrived following his apostasy and defection. Alonzo claims at the end that his philosophical quest was not a failure, for he now knows that he does not know much. Hence the two roads to ignorance.Eliseo Vivas has taught at Wisconsin, Chicago, Ohio State, and Northwestern. He has also edited journals, published widely, and has been a participant and, indeed, a major force in most of the intellectual discussions of his time. His examination of his contemporaries beliefs and detailed analysis of the views he rejects are therefore especially valuable. Those peace-loving minds who find Alonzo s adventures relevant to an understanding of their age will be fascinated by this unique and important book."