• A remarkably intelligent book.  — The Washington Post, November 1981

 

• Radical Vegetarianism is a feast of words. ... Delight in or detest its literary embellishments, no one can find Radical Vegetarianism less than unique. ... There are in places brutal honesty, shocking and raw, and in others poignant beauty. Often they coexist in a single sentence. ... If vegetarianism has its cult classic, this is it. — Animals’ Agenda, July/August 1990 (full review above, Free PDF Downloads)

 

• Radical Vegetarianism is an unusual book both in style and perspective. ... It is food for thought and an exercise in semantics and philosophy. ... Braunstein is a philosopher. He's also a great writer, with a good sense of humor. ... Books such as this are rare in comparison to the large number of vegetarian cookbooks and books on diet and health. ... This guide to higher consciousness is unique in the history of vegetarian literature. ... This is a rare, inimitable book, one to savor and turn to, time and again. … It's the kind of book that will endure. ... Radical Vegetarianism is so well crafted that it could become a classic. — Vegetarian Times, February 1982  (read full review above, within Free PDF Downloads)

 

• A refreshing and stimulating alternative to the plethora of mundane diet books. — Healthful Living  

 

• Thick with thought, this literary feast ... is vegetarianism's most eloquent and original voice. — Vegetarian Voice, Fall 1993  

 

• As a manifesto defending the vegan way of life, Radical Vegetarianism is the first of its kind. — International Society for Animal Rights Report, Sept 1982

 

• This is one of the best books on the many sided aspects of vegetarianism. It is exceptionally well written and carefully reasoned. — The Trumpeter: Journal of Eco-Philosophy, Winter 1994

 

• Long before the current crop of food politic experts had formulated their thoughts on the subject, Mark Mathew Braunstein published Radical Vegetarianism. Three decades later, RV endures as the seminal work on ethical vegetarianism, musing on the deep roots of the lifestyle, less for physical reasons than for philosophical ones. Braunstein’s writing style is poetry masquerading as prose ("One way to make ends meet is to make meat end”). … Now fully revised and updated for a new millennium of conscientious omnivores, Braunstein’s words should be required reading. Twentieth century veg pioneer Scott Nearing proposed that if your thinking is one step ahead of the masses, you are perceived a leader; two steps, you’re considered dangerous. Radical Vegetarianism was three steps ahead when first written, and still is. It’s just as meaningful today as it was in 1981, if not more so. – Veg News, December 2011, pages 98-99 

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from the Lantern Books catalog: 

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Now fully revised and updated, Radical Vegetarianism remains as "dialectical, but also a little diabolical" as when it was first published in 1981. Hailed as "remarkably intelligent" (Washington Post), the book takes on the canned canards, sacred cows, and wooly thinking of carnivores and vegetarians alike, and proposes a vegetarianism that transcends the stereotypes of potlucks and Birkenstocks to one that embraces contradiction and candor, and a raw truth that bucks conventional wisdom. Or, as Braunstein says (channeling the Ancients), “Gnaw Thyself.” 

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“Vegetarians are not a better sort of people, just a better sort of carnivore,” writes Braunstein, “and carnivores are just a better sort of cannibal.” Erudite and polemical, idiosyncratic and passionate, Radical Vegetarianism is, as the author states, "not a voice of sanity amid so much madness, for the difference is moot and easy to refute, but a voice of the living amid the silence of the dead."