Barrett wrote philosophical works for nonexperts, including Irrational Man and The Illusion of Technique, which remain in print.
[1] Like many intellectuals of his generation, Barrett flirted with Marxism before turning his energies to providing readable introductions to European philosophical schools, notably existentialism.
He knew many other literary figures of the day, including Edmund Wilson, Philip Rahv, and Albert Camus.
He was deeply influenced by the philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche, Søren Kierkegaard, and Martin Heidegger and was the editor of D. T. Suzuki's 1956 classic Zen Buddhism.
Barrett's Law is named for him: "not everyone who might read the productions of scholarly writers is an expert in the fields discussed" (p. 99).