[lit-ideas] Re: Reading Heidegger after publication of the 'Black Notebooks'
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 16 Feb 2015 15:53:13 +0100
I wonder if anyone thought of publishing Heidegger's used toilet paper.
O.K.
On Mon, Feb 16, 2015 at 3:46 PM, <cblists@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> For those who want a more nuanced discussion of the publication of
> Heidegger's 'Black Notebooks' and their relevance in assessing Heidegger's
> importance as a philosopher I recommend reading the following three
> articles (from which I quote short excerpts):
>
> Bernard-Henry Levy's "Why read Heidegger?"
>
> "The real question [is] not to recall for the umpteenth time that this
> great philosopher was also a real Nazi.
>
> "Rather it was to ask what can and should be done today about the living
> paradox, the terrifying oxymoron, of an individual about whom we cannot
> even say, as we could about Céline, that he had two separate faces. We
> cannot do that with Heidegger because in the same works, the same
> sentences, often the same word, the man appears as a lofty philosopher and
> as a purveyor of infamy.
>
> "Should we just forget him? ... Jump at finally having a good reason not
> to have to struggle with one of the most arduous and complex of
> contemporary philosophers?
>
> "I don't think so. ..."
>
>
> http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bernardhenri-levy/why-read-heidegger_b_6570986.html
>
> Jonathan Ree's "In defence of Heidegger: You do not have to admire a
> philosopher personally to admire his work"
>
> "I think that those who say that because [Heidegger] was anti-Semitic we
> should not read his philosophy show a deep ignorance about the whole
> tradition of writing and reading philosophy. The point about philosophy is
> not that it offers an anthology of opinions congenial to us, which we can
> dip into to find illustrations of what you might call greeting card
> sentiments. Philosophy is about learning to be aware of problems in your
> own thinking where you might not have suspected them. It offers its readers
> an intellectual boot camp, where every sentence is a challenge, to be
> negotiated with care. The greatest philosophers may well be wrong: the
> point of recognising them as great is not to subordinate yourself to them,
> but to challenge yourself to work out exactly where they go wrong."
>
>
> http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/arts-and-books/in-defence-of-heidegger#.UyMRutxIZbz
>
> Richard Polt and Gregory Fried in conversation with Thomas Sheehan: "no
> one can jump over his own shadow"
>
> "RP & GF: The three volumes of 'Black Notebooks' ... leave no reasonable
> doubt that Heidegger had anti-Semitic attitudes. And his public statements,
> even into the 1940s, indicated that he supported ... the Nazi regime and
> its war efforts. How do you see this affecting his philosophy?
>
> "TS: Heidegger’s attempt to launder his cultural pessimism and revanchist
> nationalism through his “metaphysical history” of the downfall of the West
> is a complete failure and should be recognized as such. This includes, most
> saliently and infamously, his undeniable anti-Semitism and Nazism.
>
> "In my opinion, the attempts of Heideggerians to 'explain' his
> anti-Semitism via exculpatory qualifications (e.g., 'he wasn’t a biological
> anti-Semite like the Nazis') are abject strategies of avoidance, a
> desperate refusal to accept the obvious. The question, rather, is whether
> his deep cultural anti-Semitism, along with his craven allegiance to
> Hitler, hemorrhage into the core of his philosophy.
>
> "Some, like the indefatigable but philosophically challenged Emmanuel
> Faye, insist that Heidegger was a Nazi even before he was born and that
> from beginning to end his philosophy was nothing but an effort—in Faye’s
> words—'to introduce Nazism into philosophy.'
>
> "I argue ... that the essential core of Heidegger’s philosophy was in
> place by the end of 1930 and that it is in no way tainted by his later
> Nazism or his abiding anti-Semitism."
>
> http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/no-one-can-jump-over-his-own-shadow/
>
> Chris Bruce,
> in Kiel, Germany
>
> P.S. Please note that 'recommend reading' is not semantically equivalent
> to 'agree uncritically with the entire contents of'.
>
> - CB------------------------------------------------------------------
> To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
> digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
>
Other related posts:
