George Santayana is one of the most notable, and paradoxical, figures in American intellectual life. He is, for example, a philosopher whose work combines naturalism and platonism; whose philosophy is highly literary, while his literary works are highly philosophical. He was an academician who hated the academy; a Catholic who didn't believe Catholic dogma; and an American by residence, education, and profession, who maintained his Spanish citizenship, although as an adult he never lived in Spain.

Perhaps this paradoxical quality was partly a result of a life divided between not only two cultures but also between two centuries. Consequently, his work, which is in many ways modern and advanced, is in other ways old-fashioned. Early in his career he thought of himself as a poet, and he continued to write verse at least occasionally throughout his life. Yet it was always traditional, formal, and severely classical. His literary...