Time of the Magicians

A grand narrative of the intertwining lives of Walter Benjamin, Martin Heidegger, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Ernst Cassirer, major philosophers whose ideas shaped the twentieth century

The year is 1919. The horror of the First World War is still fresh for the protagonists of Time of the Magicians, each of whom finds himself at a crucial juncture. Walter Benjamin, having survived ...

(展开全部)

A grand narrative of the intertwining lives of Walter Benjamin, Martin Heidegger, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Ernst Cassirer, major philosophers whose ideas shaped the twentieth century

The year is 1919. The horror of the First World War is still fresh for the protagonists of Time of the Magicians, each of whom finds himself at a crucial juncture. Walter Benjamin, having survived the flu during the 1918 pandemic, is trying to flee his overbearing father and floundering in his academic career. Ludwig Wittgenstein, by contrast, has dramatically decided to divest himself of the monumental fortune he stands to inherit as a scion of one of the wealthiest industrial families in Europe, in search of absolute spiritual clarity. Meanwhile, Martin Heidegger, having managed to avoid combat in war by serving instead as a meteorologist, is carefully cultivating his career. Finally, Ernst Cassirer is working furiously in academia, applying himself intensely to his writing and the possibility of a career at Hamburg University. The stage is set for a great intellectual drama, which will unfold across the next decade. The lives and ideas of this extraordinary philosophical quartet will converge as they become world historical figures. But with the Second World War looming on the horizon, their fates will be very different.

Wolfram Eilenberger stylishly traces the paths of these remarkable and turbulent lives, which feature not only philosophy but some of the most important other figures of the century, including John Maynard Keynes, Hannah Arendt, and Bertrand Russell. In doing so, he tells a gripping story about four of history’s most ambitious and passionate thinkers, and illuminates with rare clarity and economy their brilliant ideas, which all too often have been regarded as enigmatic or opaque.

About the Author

Wolfram Eilenberger is an internationally bestselling author and philosopher. He is the founding editor of Philosophie Magazin and hosts the television program Sternstunde Philosophie on the Swiss public broadcasting network SRF. In 2018, he published Time of the Magicians in Germany. The book instantly became a bestseller there, as well as in Italy and Spa...

(展开全部)

About the Author

Wolfram Eilenberger is an internationally bestselling author and philosopher. He is the founding editor of Philosophie Magazin and hosts the television program Sternstunde Philosophie on the Swiss public broadcasting network SRF. In 2018, he published Time of the Magicians in Germany. The book instantly became a bestseller there, as well as in Italy and Spain, and won the prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger in France. It has been translated into more than twenty languages. Eilenberger has been a prolific contributor of essays and articles to many publications, among them Die Zeit, Der Spiegel, and Cicero, and has taught at the University of Toronto, Indiana University Bloomington, and Berlin University of the Arts.

CONTENTS
I .
PROLOGUE : THE MAGICIANS
The Arrival of God . High Fliers Maintaining One ' s Composure . The Davos Myth . Human Questions . Without Foundation . Two Visions . At a Crossroads . Where Is Benjamin ? Fail Bet - ter . Does My Life Need a Goal ? . The One - Man Republic
II .
LEAPS : 1 9 1 9
· · · · · · (更多)

CONTENTS
I .
PROLOGUE : THE MAGICIANS
The Arrival of God . High Fliers Maintaining One ' s Composure . The Davos Myth . Human Questions . Without Foundation . Two Visions . At a Crossroads . Where Is Benjamin ? Fail Bet - ter . Does My Life Need a Goal ? . The One - Man Republic
II .
LEAPS : 1 9 1 9
What to Do ? . A Refuge . Critical Days . Roman - tic Theses . New Self - Awareness . Flights . The Transformation . Ethical Acts . A Sorrow Be - yond Dreams . An Interesting Condition . Ex - posed Flanks . A World Without a View . The Primal Scientist . No Alibi . The New Realm . Fi - delity to the Event . German Virtues . Unloved . Electrified

III .
LANGUAGES : 1 9 1 9 - 1 9 2 0
Figuratively Speaking . Viennese Bridges Poet - ic Precision . Against the World Three Dots in The Hague Pictures of Facts . The Barber . Rus - sell on the Ladder . Why the World Does Not Exist . Under Pressure . The Obscured Gaze . Lonely Together . Two Oddballs . Worlds Ahead The Breakthrough of Authenticity . Something in Media Flappers . The Task . Radical Transla - tion . Cult and Sound Goethe in Hamburg . The Fundamental Phenomenon . The Will to Multi - plicity . Onward . Does the Language Exist ?

IV .
CULTURE : 1 9 2 2 - 1 9 2 3
A Hut of One ' s Own . Strange Callings Existen - tial Health Check . Stormy Weather . Wars of Attrition . Bad Neighbors Good Neighbors . Utopia on the Bookshelf . The Outcome of Myth The New Enlightenment . Across the River . In the Maelstrom The Third Man . Goethe in Weimar . More Light . Freedom or Fate . Choice or Decision . The Divorced Republic . Leap of Salvation . Redeeming Transcendence . Ruth - lessness . Three - Quarters Understood . In Ther - apy . Top Down

V .
YOU : 1 9 2 3 - 1 9 2 5
The Idiot . It ' s Complicated Hospitality From Hamburg to Bellevue . Snake Experiments . Tunnel and Light . Weimar Topples . Mighty Fortresses - Being an Event - You , Demon . Inthe Midst of Being To Think the Hardest Thing Amor Mundi Hunger Cures . Goodbye Deutschland . Grapes and Almonds New
Beginnings

VI .
FREEDOM : 1 9 2 5 - 1 9 2 7
Red Stars . Critical Prologues . A Case for Adam . Grief Work . Remembered Perception . Tristes Tropiques . Critical Album . Palestine or Com - munism . Neighbors . To Work . Exposing the Question . The Time of Dasein . Philosophizing with a Hammer : The Study of Equipment . Sturm und Angst . That Certain Something : Running Ahead into Death . The Hamburg School . The Hidden Origin Plurality of Out - come - Self - Fashioning Through Openness . The Fault in Our Stars . Out of the Mouths of Babes . Engineers of Speech . A Little List . The Respon -
sibility Principle . A Fainting Fit

VII .
ARCADES : 1 9 2 6 - 1 9 2 8
Technical Talent . For Gods Alone . A Circle Without a Master . Much to Learn You Still Have . Instability . Moscow or Bust . The Hell of Other People . A Man Without a Framework . Party for One . High Seas In the Eye of the Storm . An Emergency in Frankfurt . Individual and Republic . Building Work . Age of the De - mon . After Being Foundation and Abyss . Back to the Origin Homecoming Dizzy Heights
VIII .
TIME : 1 9 2 9
Slaloming . Among People . On the Eve . Relax ! . Verbal Storms : The Davos Debate . Licking Wounds - Spring Awakenings . The Three - Hun - dred - Penny Opera . The Doors . Breathless . Gaslight . The Self - Destructive Personality . Hot Dogs . The Hiker . A Day Off . Internal Difficul - ties . Back to the Everyday . Naples in Cam - bridge . Useful Reminders . The City of Words . Against the Wall

Epilogue
Photographs
Acknowledgments
List of Works
Notes
Selected Bibliography
Credits
Index
· · · · · · (收起)