<DIV>For most of the last century, William F. Buckley Jr. was the leading figure in the conservative movement in America. The magazine he founded in 1955, <I>National Review</I>, brought together writers representing every strand of conservative thought, and refined those ideas over the decades that followed. Buckley's own writings were a significant part of this development. He was not a theoretician but a popularizer, someone who could bring conservative ideas to a vast audience through dazzling writing and lively wit.<BR><BR>Culled from millions of published words spanning nearly sixty years, <I>Athwart History: Half a Century of Polemics, Animadversions, and Illuminations</I> offers Buckley's commentary on the American and international scenes, in areas ranging from Kremlinology to rock music. The subjects are widely varied, but there are common threads linking them all: a love for the Western tradition and its American manifestation; the belief that human beings thrive best in a free society; the conviction that such a society is worth defending at all costs; and an appreciation for the quirky individuality that free people inevitably develop. <br></DIV>