Michael Oakeshott was the preeminent philosopher of the Anglo-Saxon tradition during the postwar years. Skeptical about the supposed muscularly power of politics. Opponent of the managerial (aka, technocratic) state. Critic of politics’ unrealistic aims and grandiloquent words. Subtle. Solitary. At end of his life, he was offered one of Britain’s highest awards for intellectual achievement, The Companion Honour. Rejected it.This book compiles his personal and philosophical notes, written over 60 years. Most of them are aphorisms and short reflections. “This is a sort of Zibaldone, a written chaos,” wrote Oakeshott of his beloved notebooks. They can be read in any order. Without a rational plan. Without a managerial map.I read this book in my Kindle. I highlighted many notes, more than in any other (e)book. Looking back at this notes, I noticed that they can be sorted in three different groups. The first group has to do with Oakeshott's skepticism about democracy and politics in general. Here is a small sample.“Democracy accepted as inevitable, & not as good." “The question to ask is – is not life more tolerable in a democracy which fails than in another sort of community – e.g., a despotism – which succeeds? Rather, all types fail, the best is not that which gives the greatest or easiest prospect of succeeding (for that is largely illusion) but that which is most tolerable in failure.”“Politics are necessarily opportunistic. The politician works under conditions that make this unavoidable. The necessary toleration of evil. The gross oversimplification in politics.”“The doctrine of ‘more or less.’ The ‘logic of imperfection’: in practical matters one must not strive for perfection.”The second group of aphorisms has to do with Oakeshott’s existentialism, with his subtle complaints about our short and groundless lives.“The passing of time, terrible & yet blessed; to understand this is to understand the human condition.”“There is no substitute for youth.”“The worst thing about life is that the worst part comes last.”“The condition of mortality – the irony of life. Achievement defeats itself in the moment of victory. The seeds of death are always there.”And the third group concerns with the ambiguous nature of love.“The charm of love. The sudden illumination of life; the illusion that the greatest mystery –why we have been born– is solved; the new value that attaches itself to the most insignificant things; the dissolution of things that had become fixed immovable shapes; desire & contemplation for a moment united; invulnerability – neither adverse opinion nor misfortune, nor death itself can touch us; infinite possibility; a world that is always at its end but perpetually renewed; lightness; peace without immobility; the absence of calculation, freedom.”“To be loved is to be remade – that’s why it may be resented.”In short, this book should be read by anyone interested in the limits (and possibilities) of politics, life and love. The rest can skip it. Safely.