The International Sociological Association recently voted Norbert Elias’s The Civilizing Process as one of the top ten works of sociology in the twentieth century Elias’s masterwork, his other writings, and his influence on the field of sociology are the subjects of this book. It is a readable and thoughtful intellectual portrait of Elias, generally regarded as one of the outstanding social thinkers of this century. His Civilizing Process traced the ‘civilizing’ of manners and personality in Western Europe since the late Middle Ages, and shows how it was related to the formation of states and the control of violence. His later writings, often scattered about and difficult, range from sport to human relations, through the changing relations between men and women to time, the growth of knowledge and the sciences, to the prospects of nuclear war. Mennell examines the full range of Elias’s work and presents it in a cogent and accessible manner, all in a book which is a pleasure to read.