This exciting title delivers as promised -- it's a documentation of the philosopher Martin Heidegger's lifelong sympathies and connections to the NaziThis exciting title delivers as promised -- it's a documentation of the philosopher Martin Heidegger's lifelong sympathies and connections to the Nazi movement.
I expected to read more than the author gives us about the way in which Heidegger adapted his brand of existentialism to support fascist ideology. Farias instead puts heavy emphasis on academia and university politics, which, I suppose, are a necessary part of the story. We get prodigious accounts of such things as which rectors and deans of which universities attended what particular meeting, function, or seminar. It all goes to make the author's point quite convincingly, but much of the detail could have been shunted off to the appendix with no loss of integrity to the book's thesis. ...more
More and more these days the mavens of American opinion have taken pains to frame the Declaration of Independence as either a rhetorical relic or a naMore and more these days the mavens of American opinion have taken pains to frame the Declaration of Independence as either a rhetorical relic or a narrowly directed legal document. Here, author Alexander Tsesis tell us why they do: the assertion that all men are created equal found in the Declaration's preamble. That notion doesn't square with the reality today's political system.
And do the opinion makers mean to change that reality? It doesn't seem likely. Instead, they reason from it that the DOI must not have had much actual significance in American law and culture in the first place, or so the current trend in academics and the media goes. And that frames inequality as an insoluble problem. This book means to counteract that perception.
Tsesis dispels the notion that the Declaration of Independence is a meaningless document and further argues that quite the opposite is the case. He does it by showing how the preamble to the Declaration factored into debates over every legal and social turn in American history in which the idea of equality has a bearing.
By taking that approach the author's thesis becomes a little repetitive; at each point in the nation's history he demonstrates anew how the Declaration's preamble plays a key role in building the notion of equality into both law and popular culture.
I like the book. Although I've been generally aware of the importance of the preamble, I'm surprised at how effectively the book drives home the point. As an example, the author shows how the first blow against "aristocracy" in the United States came immediately in the wake of independence with manhood emancipation. This struggle to extend voting rights to men generally, not just those who owned significant property, was carried out in good part by veterans of the Revolution who had understood themselves to be fighting for the idea of equality designated in the preamble and held that as the explicit sine qua non of joining the new federation.
From then on, more intriguing instances of what was first thought of as a battle against "aristocracies" draw attention to the enduring efficacy of the preamble of the Declaration. Readers even encounter the argument negatively, for Tsesis points out how so many countries emulating the United States excluded any reference to equality in their own founding documents; he leaves it to us to consider the legal and social systems that resulted.
I recommend this book. It has greatly helped ground my understanding of the unprecedented power of this unique document....more
In this book Maugham paints a portrait of a painter, using words. Reading it gives me a picture of the era, too. As I discovered what made this painteIn this book Maugham paints a portrait of a painter, using words. Reading it gives me a picture of the era, too. As I discovered what made this painter special I couldn’t get Nietzsche’s overman out of my mind. The absence of judgment makes me think of the Bloomsbury Group and the then-fashionable non-cognitive approach to ethics. Freud’s ideas as well thread their way through the narrative.
It’s interesting to read a middle- or upper-class writer taking up the subject of poverty, and in these 200 pages Maugham stands out. The protagonist, Charles Strickland, throws up a life of ease for the poverty and hardship endemic to the life of a painter. We come to see that poverty is no problem to those who eschew the all-too-many in response to their inner drives. For if you have the inner fiber it takes, hunger and sickness pose no problem. So our aspiring painter lives among the poorest yet remains uncontaminated by their poverty and beyond material want. The gutter poor around him seem happy with their lot, too, so everything’s hunky-dory. Or, if it isn’t, a dose of non-cognitive ethics will settle even the most overly excited conscience.
In any case, none of that goes to the author’s point. He’s simply telling us the story of a man whose non-traditional rejection of social norms and interpersonal concerns leads him to ... contentment with both. Maugham knows he must give us Charles Strickland on the protagonist’s own terms. And, as with Goodbye to All That, trying to arrive at a point of view about what we’re reading proves futile and somehow silly.
Like Robert Graves, Somerset Maugham in this book gives us an apparently judgment-free perspective on life. And again like Graves, this author writes with style. Despite the inter-war approach to ideas, the prose flows easily, simply and effectively. I can recommend this book for any reader who enjoys a writer's style apart from the sometimes annoying substance. This book gives readers both style and substance in a way that highlights the thematic touchstones of early 20th-century literature....more
My best exposure to non-Western literature comes courtesy of Egypt's authors. In comparison to them I was rather disappointed by Midnight's Children, My best exposure to non-Western literature comes courtesy of Egypt's authors. In comparison to them I was rather disappointed by Midnight's Children, about India. But when I read this short novel by Tagore I encountered a Bengali author capable of matching Naguib Mahfouz, although writing about completely different subjects.
If this sounds too esoteric to readers in search of good writing who haven't yet ventured into non-Western literature, it's my way of saying simply to read this book. You'll be glad you did....more
Included in this book is more short poetry than I've normally seen in the decadence genre. Most of the stories are a few pages. Some are okay and otheIncluded in this book is more short poetry than I've normally seen in the decadence genre. Most of the stories are a few pages. Some are okay and others are quite good....more
This detailed intellectual history contrasts the "radical" Enlightenment of Spinoza with the moderate version represented by John Locke. The author doThis detailed intellectual history contrasts the "radical" Enlightenment of Spinoza with the moderate version represented by John Locke. The author documents a five-way battle for the minds of modern people and shows how the most radical ideas of the era found their way into the High Enlightenment. The focus is on Europe, but the implications for the new American state are obvious, helping us over here sort out what is meant by the expression that the United States is a "product of the Enlightenment." The book looks at the Enlightenment in extraordinary detail. A year or more of French will help readers get through the many untranslated passages....more
This is the best book I've read by a Russian author during the time of the Soviet Union. Grossman changes out socialist realism for a less socialism aThis is the best book I've read by a Russian author during the time of the Soviet Union. Grossman changes out socialist realism for a less socialism and more realism, providing readers with a more intricate and honest picture of what that country was like. While I've read Western and German accounts of World War II, only now have I gotten any detailed account of what it looked like from the Soviet point of view. The writing is good-to-great, and the author is perceptive about things Westerners might not notice in quite the same way. The book drags in places, but this is easily forgiven by the story arc, the deftness with which the author narrates it, and the utterly unique perspective it puts on that incredible event in history....more
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