No comments about Lamentations of Youth: The Diaries of Gershom Scholem, 1913-1919.

5 comments about The Inner Life of Krishnamurti: Private Passion and Perennial Wisdom.

1. This is a wonderful book. Not only because it explores for the first time and in the deepest way, the inner life of one of the most astonishing figures in world history, but because it's a very lucid exploration into the teachings of Krishnamurti. This exploration makes clear of the urgency there is for an actual human transformation. Our insensibility and our shalowness have reached to a very critical point of ignorance which is the real cause of violence, our suffering and our sence of meaninglessness. It is of great importance that we realize that only through an individual investigation we will be able to trancend our ignorance. Such an investigation cannot be of the nature of past investigations, which have been governed by the analytical mind. As it is expressed in this book and in countless times by K himself, one must totally die to the past and to our personal history to engage in this kind of observation. This is not an easy task for us, people of the 21st century, deeply conditioned by the patterns of our culture and by all of our ideas and preconceptions of what life is supposed to be.There can be no other real revolution than that of the psique. We must effortlessly renounce to all the methods that have been offered to us, and to all the happiness manuals that promess freedom and elightment if we do this or that. We have to be able to stand alone for the first time and listen to life without the influence of words, we must aproach life in new and unknown ways. This is how we can become trully responsable with life as a whole. Freedom and real maturity won't come in the future, they can only occur now because the present moment is all we have, it's where reality actually takes place.
   I am a young person living in this messed up world swamped with information, entertainment, competition, greed, violence and worst of all, a big sence of meaninglessness. But I do feel there is a way out of this, and I do feel that life can be much simpler, richer and meaningful than we could ever imagine, but this calls for real work and real engagement.
   There is a highly recomended book which is quoted by Sanat and can be found at Amazon.com : "The Paradox of Intention" by Marvin Shaw.
   (I want to thank Ariel Sanat for this wonderful piece of work, which has touched me and other people I know, in a very profound way. If anyone knows how to contact the author I would be really grateful-my mail is aprilandseptember@yahoo.com thanks)



2. A deeply thoughtful and well supported look at a previously obscured dimension of K's life. Scientifically rigorous in it's honest approach of this topic, the book is a must have for anyone who has been touched by the life of Jiddu Krishnamurti.



3. The reader from Alamogordo is completely right. Several people have written bad reviews of this excellent book, giving it one or two stars, thus bringing down the number of stars for it, & giving a very distorted perception of its true worth for a potential new reader. It's OK for people to have different points of view, of course. But it is obvious to anyone who really knows the subject, that some of these reviewers are ignorant of one aspect or another of it, and/or have some pet theory to promote, & are perhaps afraid of the truths that this book shares with its readers.
   This is a truly extraordinary accomplishment, because what K said has been believed to be totally incompatible with the ancient esoteric tradition. Yet Sanat shows here, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that when one looks at the FACTS and not at the repetition of unfounded rumors, it becomes clear that the two are seamlessly related. This book does require having both an open mind and having wide knowledge and understanding of the subject, which is a tall order. But it's "right on the money." Even someone without a great deal of knowledge or understanding of all the issues, but with a truly open mind, would get a great deal out of it.
   This is the best book on K's life & teaching, to date.



4. This book is an extraordinary achievement, since it shows, for the first time ever, the very real connection there is between the theosophical movement and Krishnamurti, as well as between Krishnamurti and the ancient perennial wisdom. Sanat does this not by speculating or spinning unsupported opinions (as has been done quite dishonestly by some of his reviewers below). He achieves this by appealing by actual historical facts, by actually quoting what K REALLY said (as opposed to OPINIONS some people have formed without reference to FACTS). This is, so far, the ONLY book on Krishnamurti that addresses these issues without preconceptions, but by quoting sources and giving precise references, and by appealing to what actually happened.
   Unlike every other author on this subject to date, Sanat lets his reader know when he is offering his own personal perceptions of the many facts that he marshals. When he does that, it is clear that he bends over backwards to let the reader come to his/her own conclusions.
   It is unfortunate that some reviewers, who have obviously some pet theory to defend, have misrepresented the real worth of this excellent piece of research. I am particularly intrigued by the fact that the first "two" reviewers sent their messages within two days of "each other," and say pretty much the same thing. One of "them" was from "San Felipe, CA," & "the other" claims to be from New Mexico, yet does not know how to spell his own hometown, calling it "Albuquerqui." Then there is yet another reader from San Felipe, CA, writing three years later, but saying pretty much the same thing! I smell a rat!
   If you are serious about understanding who K was, please do yourself a favor, and read this book. But do so with an open mind. What Sanat has achieved here is almost like solving a Zen koan: What K said was simultaneously compatible with the best that the perennial wisdom has taught throughout the ages, yet at the same time was breaking new ground, by showing us the dire need to disassociate ourselves COMPLETELY from all identifications, such as with Buddhism & Advaita Vedanta, before there can be clarity in our lives. Sanat has done a magnificent job, in showing with astonishing clarity that what has been considered incompatible, is actually eminently compatible. In doing this, he has placed K in a proper historical setting, something that had never been done before by anyone, because in order to do that, one must do the enormous work it must have taken for him to have been able to achieve this.
   Contrary to what some reviewers have said, Sanat has shown how and why what really matters is that each of us engage in a transformative lifestyle. K's status, or lack thereof, is absolutely irrelevant in that quest. THAT is what Sanat makes crystal clear, unsupported criticisms of his work notwithstanding.
   So do read the book. But be prepared to do a great deal of research yourself (like Sanat has done), before coming to conclusions based on previous knowledge. This book is a genuine creative effort, and deserves being read with a genuinely open mind.



5. Let us just for a minute imagine Krishnamurti himself reading this book. Would he invite the author for tea afterwards? I think not. One can only imagine why a writer who supposedly understood Krishnamurti's ideas would be so interested in what Krishnamurti himself bent over backwards to avoid discussing. The author claims that K didn't reembrace the Theosophical Society legends surrounding his enlightnment journey to protect his devotees from their own distracting fantasies about the occult, etc. Pul-leese! Krishnamurti's neverending emphasis was on his listeners' ability to do their own investigations into what was "the case." Thereby hung their salvation from conditioning. The picture painted of Krishnamurti by some recent authors, including Sanat, has been of a secretive man interested in concealing both his so-called inner and personal lives from the spiritually unwashed masses. Perhaps, but this author does not make a convincing case for Krishnamurti as a closet Theosophist.

2 comments about The Promise of Politics.

1. Jerome Kuhn's introduction is a little patronizing of Arendt, but it's short and skimpy and won't deter you from plunging into Arendt's prose, beginning with her startling revision of Socrates. For Arendt, Socrates helped split politics and philosophy with one decisive strategy, his defense at his famous trial. It's typical of Arendt that she sees thought in dramatic terms, always with a terminal at either end of time, existing not so much in essential terms but in contingent, always partial and always temporary states of being--human beings reacting to strain or stress, and in turn launching something new to spur new reaction. Thus Socrates becomes interesting only when in peril.
   
   Because so many of these papers were presented as reviews or for occasional purposes (such as lectures) perhaps this emphasis on the dramatic might be explained thus. But oh, how she loved to be able to use "The End of Tradition" as the title of a paper, its apocalyptic note gave her a sort of gleeful, if embarrassed, outrage.
   
   The master text here is the longest, the INTRODUCTION INTO POLITICS, oddly titled with "into" in special italics as though there might be an INTRODUCTION "out of" politics, as I suppose there might. It reads like a novel. We haven't had this novella translated into English before now. Whoever translated it did a fabulous job of approximating Arendt's nearly colloquial, clean and rich English. She was a stylist before anything else and this collection, published on the 30th anniversary of her death, burnishes the legend. It's no disgrace and it makes you wonder, if more papers are up there in her archive just waiting for new eyes to take a new look.



2. Politics is considered as a means to an end that lies outside itself. When force is used to create freedom, political principles vanish. She wonders if politics do have any meaning at all anymore.
   
   She finds politics to be the never-ending endeavor of the plurality of humans to live together and share in mutually guaranted freedom. This is 'the promise of politics.' She questions the relation of politics to human freedom. I think that her understanding of politics is worldwide and not American. I know only the U. S. version, and it is back-stabbing with constant lies about the opponent (a negative effect on the candidates and the voters), promises of things which will never happen (and the politician knows it when he makes the false promises). Politics is dirty business.
   
   Today's politics is nothing like that of the Greeks (beginning), Romans (founding) nor the Christian (forgiving). Here we believe in the division between church and state, thereby keeping these two entities separate. They are completely different in precept and beliefs and deeds which seem to be foreign as Spain is from Japan.
   
   This is an intellectual thesis written in the '50s (and my! have things changed since then -- no more Kennedys in power, no Krushchev who had a hole in his shoe, no more totalitarianism or corrupt Jews. She bases her political thoughts on philisophy. She has written EICHMANN IN JERUSALEM, THE JEW AS PARIAH, THE HUMAN CONDITION, THE LIFE OF THE MIND, and RESPONSIBILITY AND JUDGEMENT. She is a deep thinker on the subjects of 'revolution,' 'violence,' 'political philosophy,' 'Jewish identity,' 'understanding,' and 'love.'
   
   She was born in Germany and migrated to the U. S. after WWII where she has taught at Berkeley, Princeton, University of Chicago, and the New School for Social Research. She died thirty years ago.

5 comments about Voltaire in Love.

1. Nancy Mitford's Voltaire in Love is an entertaining book, full of historic characters, revealing both their best and worst attributes in politics, society, the arts, and the bedroom.
   
   The book is primarily about the long affair between Voltaire and his mistress, Mme. Emilie du Chatelet, which was certainly a meeting of two exceptionally brilliant minds of the Enlightenment. Yet the book really covers the early adult years of Voltaire and does not cover his later successes and fame.
   
   Voltaire, a graduate of Louise-le-Grand Jesuit School, was a brilliant but sarcastic student, who became popular with his witty poems and plays. Yet his satire often went to far which on more than one occassion resulted in imprisonment in the Bastile. Like Moliere, Voltaire wrote witty comedy that appealed to the sophisticated upperclasses. Yet early in his career he is forced into exile to London where he wrote plays for Queen Caroline and King George. Gradually his star rose in the French court of Louis XV. Queen Marie Leczinska found him charming and gave him a pension. Louis XV also gave him a pension but was less comfortable with Voltaire than was his wife and his father in law, Stanislas Leczinska, ex-king of Poland. The king's famous mistress, Mme. Jeanne-Antoinette de Pompadour, was an admirer of Voltaire also and there is some evidence that she came to his rescue when he ran afoul of the censors of Louis XV. Thus much of the book is about the highest levels of French society and their impact on the arts, sciences, and humanities.
   
   As is the case with many bright and opinionated thinkers, rivalry and jealousy and ambition create the conditions for long lasting enemies. This is the case between Voltaire and Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, a philosopher whom Voltaire seemed to disdain. However Voltaire's primary rivalry was with Abbe Desfontaines. Abbe Desfontaines was found molesting male adolescent chimney sweeps and was sentenced to burn at the stake for sodomy. Voltaire was one of his only allies and Desfontaine was saved. Yet, amazingly, Desfontaine became extremely critical and bitter and vindictive toward Voltaire leading the reader to recognize that no good deed goes unpunished.
   
   The attempts of Frederick II of Prussia to lure Voltaire into his court was amazing underhanded strategy. Frederick II, creating a completely male homosexual court, seemed to be obsessed with Voltaire and secretly tried to undermine him in France so that offers to come to Prussia would be more appealing.
   
   The book however is primarily about the affair of Voltaire and Emilie du Chatelet. They were quite a pair, both studious and brilliant, who allowed each other ample space to think and create. Voltaire and Emilie both popularized the works of Sir Issac Newton and advanced the fields of science and mathematics. French scholarly society prefered to continue to support Descarte's theories, primarily because he was French, a loyalty that Voltaire saw as standing in the way of rational thought. The book takes us through the many journeys of Voltaire and Emily outside of their remote mansion in the countryside. We see Emilie struggle in a game of strategy with King Frederick II for the loyalty of Voltaire. We see Voltaire trying to be supportive during Emilie's outrageous gambling addition. Her son, Florent-Francois is virtually raised in a home with two fathers. Eventually Emilie falls into lust for the handsome bright Saint-Lambert and wishes to continue her 3 man life with a rich lenient legal husband, her older more mature lover who has become her best friend, and her younger sex toy boyfriend. Unfortunately she becomes pregnant with Saint-Lambert and at age 43 dies 2 days after giving birth.
   
   Well written, well documented, engaging, entertaining, and full of witty satiric details, this is an accomplishment that you will enjoy.



2. it is NOT a biography. It is a bounch of events glued together. At times I felt lost because she jumps from one topic to another and makes the reader confused when she throws a few strange sounding names without explaining who they were. As for the research of the subject I can't comment on the french part, however, on the polish side, the author didn't do a whole lot research because she couldn't even spell the name of an ex-King of Poland correctly! It's Stanis³aw Leszczyñski, not Stanislas Leczinski!!! She also undermines the linguistic abilities of the readers, thinking maybe that no-one but the French can really figure out the french language. I would not recommend this book if you really want to learn something about Voltaire and his love life, because there was no love life in that book!!



3. The hilarious modern comedy featuring the Ghost of Voltaire returning to the 21st century, "A Visit From Voltaire" Visit from Voltaire, A cites this book as one of the main sources for the period spanning the love affair of Madame de Chatelet and the King of the Englightenment, Voltaire. Another book that updates this information is Passionate Minds by David Boganis,Passionate Minds: The Great Love Affair of the Enlightenment, Featuring the Scientist Emilie du Chatelet, the Poet Voltaire, Sword Fights, Book Burnings, Assorted Kings, but this is the book that hooked me first. And it remains one of the best books to date, despite a few little hitches in her facts, for readability, entertainment and capturing the spirit of Voltaire's middle years. Anybody who reads it will finish with a wonderful understanding of the man's energy, resilience and courage. A must.



4. Nancy Mitford was a brilliant writer, and the bedrock of virtually all her works - even the histories - was satire. And, true to the first law of all satirists, she takes no prisoners, even in dealing with such luminaries as Voltaire and his lover, Mme du Chatelet. From the very start, for instance, she tells us that Voltaire rarely had any original thoughts: his true genius was in his turn of phrase. In fact, to Mme du Chatelet's great embarassment, he was likely impotent, was virtually banished from Versailles, flirted outrageously with the openly gay King Frederick of Prussia and, later, developed an infatuation for his own niece.

   Mme du Chatelet does rather better in Mitford's estimation - she is portrayed as a gifted scientist and an independently important literary figure - but as a lover, she too is deeply flawed. Time and again, she drove Voltaire close to bankruptcy with her gambling debts. And her premature death was brought on by childbirth - not Voltaire's baby, mind, but those of her "toy boy" lover. Yet it is clear that, for all that, she had met in Voltaire her true life partner, and within their own adulterous union, they tolerated each other's infidelities with good grace.

   A classic chronicle of human foibles by an author who is utterly unintimidated by her biographical subjects.




5. I couldn't put this book down, and tore through it in a matter of days. Despite being a voracious reader, it's (sadly) seldom that such a book comes along for me. The main draw for me in purchasing this book is being an avid fan of Voltaire. I had wondered just how strongly the "love story" element of the book would play out, as I'd known prior to purchasing this book that all of the intimate correspondence between Voltaire and Emilie has been lost. I'm not a "love story" kind of person, and was hoping this book would provide more of a strong picture into the personalities, foibles, strengths, habits, and routines of Voltaire primarily, and Emilie secondarily. I was not disappointed.

   If you count yourself a lover of Voltaire -- the man and his writings -- then this book is truly a must-read for you. I've read much of his essays, philosophy, short stories, et cetera, and finally (to my immense delight) feel I "know" the man.

   The personalities and temperaments of both Voltaire and Emilie were rather as I'd figured they would be, although there were a couple of genuine surprises -- some flattering, some not so flattering.

   What continues to make me curious is how these two persons defined the word "love"...the dynamics of their relationship and love was interesting, and sometimes confusing, to say the very least. Ah well, I'm speaking of dead persons here. Respect for their personages and for the deceased prohibit me from going further. And besides, after nine years of marriage, I too admit the word "love" has a myriad of nuances.

   Please enjoy this book! Ecrasez l'infame!

2 comments about Descartes: A Biography.

1. Philosophy professor Desmond Clarke presents Descartes: A Biography, an exhaustively in-depth accounting of the life of mathematician, theologian, and philosopher Rene Descartes. Obscure during his life, yet famous after his death, Descartes was a crucial contributor to the Scientific Revolution, and even tried to prove the existence of God, though his contemporaries considered those attempts questionable at best. He is immortalized today in the name of the Cartesian coordinate system, and the transformation of thought he helped usher has left repercussions up to the modern day. Descartes: A Biography examines both Descartes' personal life and his great discoveries and achievements, and is highly recommended for library and biography shelves.



2. Let's make this short but sweet: Over the last few years there has been a spate of Descartes biographies, none of them satisfying. But now Cambridge U. Press has come out with what I feel will be the standard biography of Descartes, and it had better be, inasmuch as it's over 500 pages. Clarke's biography differs from the others in that he takes the full range of Descartes' interests into account (theology, philosophy and the science) as he traces Descartes' intellectual development and his ultimate role as midwife to the Scientific Revolution, a role he `inherited' from Kepler and Galileo and one which he expanded into a search for a theory that would link theology, science and philosophy. A recluse who spent much of his life in Holland and kept in touch with the intellectual currents of his day mainly by correspondence, Descartes was a fascinating character ands Clarke does an excellent job straddling the line between Descartes the man and Descartes the thinker.
   
   In addition, the book is quite well-written; a worthy addition to the Cambridge U. Press series of Philosophical Biographies. (Previous subjects include Spinoza, Hobbes, Hegel, Kant and Kierkegaard.) While demonstrating his mastery of his subject, Clarke does an excellent job of explaining Descartes' philosophy and intellectual interests without boring his readers, a trick more scholarly authors should learn.

No comments about Quine (Arguments of the Philosophers).

1 comments about The Point of View : Kierkegaard's Writings, Vol 22.

1. The greatest challenge for any newcomer to Kierkegaard is finding the best place to gain an overview. In my opinion, this is the finest place to start. In the main work in this collection, THE POINT OF VIEW (the book also contains some smaller pieces on his Authorship), Kierkegaard sets out to explain his purposes and strategy in writing the books constituting what he calls his Authorship. Students of Kierkegaard generally refer to these books as his Pseudonymous Authorship, because in all of these he writes none of them under his own name, but employs a variety of fictionalized authors, who represent a particular point of view that is not that of Kierkegaard himself. The Pseudonymous works are contrasted with what has become to be known as Kierkegaard's Second Literature (a descriptions attributed to Kierkegaard scholar Robert L. Perkins), which comprises his edifying works and his later religious works, most of which were published under Kierkegaard's own name, though with a couple of his greatest later works published under the pseudonym Anti-Climacus.

   Some of these works, such as EITHER/OR I, contain writings on a variety of aesthetic topics. Many of the books deal with either ethical or religious topics, though the latter never from within a religious perspective. Kierkegaard's main argument in the POINT OF VIEW is that from first to last he was, even when writing on aesthetic topics, a religious author. The Pseudonymous works all presuppose a theory of stages, which Kierkegaard describes as moving from the aesthetic to the ethical and into the religious (the precise prepositions, according to SK, being of the utmost importance).

   It is not clear that Kierkegaard had a precise understanding of all this at the moment he was writing the first of his Pseudonymous works, but it is unquestionable that he moved to this point of view fairly early on. This little volume is, therefore, a wonderful introduction to Kierkegaard's most famous works, and remains one of the most fascinating reflections by a great writer on the nature of his own work ever written.

1 comments about Hegel: An Intellectual Biography.

1. Horst Altaus has done here an excellent job. We are curious about philosophers as men and women because philosophy is somewhat more intimate than science, and Hegel was present at a time of rapid change: during the Napoleonic wars, he saw first hand his "dialectic" in which the German states were turned topsy-turvy by world souls on horseback.

   Altaus intersperses his chapters with readable digests of Hegel's major works.

   There is the obligatory comment about Hegel's complex style, combined with rather patronizing praise of the simplicity and elegance of a minor work on the Württemburg constitution: for we often find that to ascribe the label "difficult" to the style or the man committs what psychologists call a fundamental attribution error.

   For we find that Hegel could use, in his minor work, a style appropriate to the theme. It is said that the style should be appropriate to the audience as if that was something we could control, but Hegel's troubles with getting enough students to attend his lectures, documented by Altaus, show both that operationalism of this sort was not his cup of tea, and that it is less fundamental than the duty of the author towards reality.

   People are difficult and their style is difficult when they try to impress (although anyone who today uses a difficult style merely to impress aliterate administrators and deans needs his head examined), but perhaps more often when they find themselves wrestling, like Jacob, with angels.

   Hegel wrote simply when writing on mere constitutions, as did John Adams. But his larger theme required on his part a couple of barrels of books, dragged about Germany by primitive transportation, and while his ethnocentrism is obvious, Hegel's philosophy of history remains in some ways up to date.

   Hegel's texts have the curious property that they share with Kant that unlike mathematical or scientific works, one gets the impression that "if this stuff is true, not only could it not be otherwise, its-being-put-otherwise would not make any sense at all. On the other hand, however, if this stuff is false, it is not false, but without any sensible meaning, whatsoever."

   IF the struggle for recognition is the motor of consciousness and of history, then any alternative story is gibberish, which is interesting, for Hegel's story is confusing enough.

   And, it's gibberish precisely because of its proposed theme, which is everything.

   Science considers the alternate worlds and chooses the true world, but the alternate worlds can be pictured. True philosophy on the other hand, is concerned with the only world, whether we interpret that as the set or join of all possible worlds, or a world in which all possibilities will come to pass.

   This alone I think generates the "complex bad" style of Kant and of Hegel.

   Hegel should be read by philosophers of consciousness, and Althaus is a good introduction: for contemporary theorists may be making fundamental mistakes.

   IF our consciousness is formed by the Other from day one, then this would predict that fetal alcohol syndrome victims and children deprived of contact with their others have no consciousness as we experience it from the inside.

   It means that "scientific" explanations of consciousness that hypostatize individual minds are doomed. No model of consciousness makes sense if it "works" in a world populated by only one consciousness. Just as mathematics requires existence assertions, consciousness requires a stronger assertion: in the beginning there is neither zero nor one but two (Madonna and child.)

   Horst includes more patronizing material on Hegel's scientific views which he shared with Goethe. They may seem to Altaus to be a dead end but forms of them survive in deep ecology. They were replaced by reductionism which, paradoxically, points of Thomas Kuhn's Oedipal destruction of old paradigms and technical whizbang as its own ultimate ratio regium. It is a reductionism which is unable to master complexity because its gesture is a hand-wave, from simple initial conditions to complex results, that in an idealist gesture ignores labor.

   It is clear that like many intellectuals, Hegel compromised himself later in life by becoming an ideologue for the Prussian state. But while the dialectic is not a license for easy self-contradiction (as Hegel's friend Goethe feared) there is a genuine dialectic between the hero of the chapter on lordship and bondage in the Phenomenology of Mind, and the apologist for a state church.

   For all other things being equal, we would like to live in a society that reflected our deepest needs and one that did not demand principled retirement. But history, as I write, staggers on.

   Althaus shows that Hegel, as many attackers have said, may have compromised himself by at the end of his life, identifying the World Spirit with the Prussian state.

   This is, of course, ethnocentrism run amuck. But Hegel's views were not evaluative. As Altaus shows, he was concerned with description of a sort that would sensibly relate individual psychology to history.

   Hegel's poltical philosophy gives no basis whatsoever for resistance to a state, or paradoxically it can be reread as revolutionary counsel.

   For if one lives in the best state, or even one that merely is the state in which the world spirit has set up shop for good or ill, revolution is either evil or futile, or both. If the state is the home of a benign world spirit, Casper the Friendly Weltgeist, then resistance is evil.

   But if (as commentators after Hegel have noted, especially Adorno) Hegel provides no reason why the world spirit may not be perceived as bad or evil in its effects on our lives, revolution is futile and evil, being futile, everything else being considered.

   In short, reading the biography of the later Hegel illustrates how old age can be lethal for philosophy. The later Marx showed some of the same intellectual decay as his carbuncles got the better of him. As T. S. Eliot wrote, "do not tell us of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly."

2 comments about Three Women in Dark Times: Edith Stein, Hannah Arendt, Simone Weil.

1. This is not an easy book. It is a glance into the lives of 3 women, Hanna Arendt, Simone Weil, and Edith Stein, each of Jewish descent and, in particular, at the response each one made to Nazism. There is a review of each woman's life and her career. A lot of space is given to the education of these women, which is especially interesting since each studied under some of the biggest names in philosophy in the 20th century. It is not easy to follow, however, unless you have some basic knowledge of Heidegger, Jaspers, Alain, Husserl. But it is still interesting. Each of these women chose a different response (not just to nazism, but to the world, actually). Arendt became strongly Zionist, and an author of wonderful books; Simone Weil, strangely at odds with her heritage, but whose essays are marvels of clarity, chose a strange path of starvation (whatever the philosophical underpinnings, one wonders about anorexia); Edith Stein converted to Catholicism and became a Carmelite nun, devoting her life to prayer (though still writing). Each of these responses is fascinating in its own right. I highly recommend this difficult, but rewarding book.



2. I am no philosopher, but have read the works of the three women who are the subjects of the book.
   I was hoping to put the three lives into the context of the intellectual and social world they lived in, and how and why they made their individual decisions on philosophy, religion, and their approach to the questions posed by both Nazism and the feminist movement.
   But little detail is given about the intellectual life. We are told the names of their mentors: but not any details of what these mentors taught (a major flaw for the non philosophy student who is not familiar with Heddiger etc.).
   At the same time, except for some fine passages on Simone Weil, there is little detail on the inner lives of the women: we see only the outline of their parallel lives, often mixed together in a confusing manner. Arendt's affair with her professor, a subject recently treated in detail in a recent Atlantic magazine article, is given one sentence. Stein converts, with no more detail on her inner life than one could read in a blurb in the Catholic encyclopedia.
   In summary, the author fails to provide details for the novice to understand the lives of these women, but does not go into sufficient depth for a philosophy student to learn anything new.
   However, the passages on Simone Weil are an exception to my criticism. I did learn a lot about both her writings and why she thought and wrote her famous letters.

No comments about Character and Conversion in Autobiography: Augustine, Montaigne, Descartes, Rousseau, and Sartre.