In this Book
- Thinking in Dark Times: Hannah Arendt on Ethics and Politics
- Book
- 2009
- Published by: Fordham University Press
summary
Hannah Arendt is one of the most important political theorists of the twentieth
century. In her works, she grappled with the dark events of that century, probing
the nature of power, authority, and evil, and seeking to confront totalitarian
horrors on their own terms. This book focuses on how, against the professionalized
discourses of theory, Arendt insists on the greater political importance of the
ordinary activity of thinking. Indeed, she argues that the activity of thinking is
the only reliable protection against the horrors that buffeted the last century. Its
essays explore and enact that activity, which Arendt calls the habit of erecting
obstacles to oversimplifications, compromises, and conventions.Most of the essays
were written for a conference at Bard College celebrating the 100th anniversary of
Arendt's birth. Arendt left her personal library and literary effects to Bard, and
she is buried in the Bard College cemetery. Material from the Bard archive-such as a
postcard to Arendt from Walter Benjamin or her annotation in her copy of
Machiavelli's The Prince-and images from her life are interspersed with the essays
in this volume.The volume will offer provocations and insights to Arendt scholars,
students discovering Arendt's work, and general readers attracted to Arendt's vision
of the importance of thinking in our own dark times.
Table of Contents
Download Full Book
- Editors’ Note
- p. xi
- Part I: Politics
- pp. 15-69
- Reflections on Antisemitism
- pp. 17-27
- Fiction as Poison
- pp. 29-42
- A Discriminating Politics
- pp. 43-54
- Part II: Lying and Politics
- pp. 71-92
- Lying and History
- pp. 79-92
- The Experience of Action
- pp. 95-102
- Part IV: Evil and Eichmann in Jerusalem
- pp. 129-157
- Is Evil Banal? A Misleading Question
- pp. 131-138
- Judging the Events of Our Time
- pp. 145-152
- Part V: Judaism and Cosmopolitanism
- pp. 159-217
- Hannah Arendt’s Jewish Identity
- pp. 207-212
- Jewish to the Core
- pp. 213-217
- Part VI: Thinking in Dark Times
- pp. 219-245
- Thinking Big in Dark Times
- pp. 221-228
- Solitude and the Activity of Thinking
- pp. 237-245
- Exile Readings: Hannah Arendt's Library
- pp. 249-260
- My Hannah Arendt Project
- pp. 269-272
- Contributors
- pp. 293-294
Additional Information
ISBN
9780823248544
Related ISBN(s)
9780823230754
MARC Record
OCLC
608692478
Pages
288
Launched on MUSE
2012-08-22
Language
English
Open Access
No