4 comments about Love's Work: A Reckoning with Life.

1. Extremely well written and seeped in verisimilitudes, this book contains a wonderful 'manifesto' of living. Instead of hiding behind comfortable scholarship, Rose uses scholarship to dig deeper into the uglier, messier side of life. We all know how to avoid reality; this books reveals one woman's attempt at facing it squarely. This books is a courageous example of dennoch preisen. Afterwards, I was painfully aware of issues I hadn't thought about in a long time. I thoroughly recommend this book.



2. This extraordinary book explains the powerful life of one woman in a way that impacts us all. The interconnectedness of living, learning and loving are demonstrated through the author's personal experiences which travel through europe, New York City and even Bennington, Vermont. Somehow the improbable happenings of her life find a way of relating closely to our own. I recommend this book.



3. This is a very special book, one that every sentient adult should read at some point in their lives. It is an adult book - shocking, moving , unsettling, hopeful.
   
   It is in some ways the companion text to Rose's 'Mourning becomes the law'. That was the definitive statement of her philosophy; this is how it applies to her lived life. The concept of 'failing towards' underpins both.
   
   Rose was clever enough to make and occupy a unique position in modern philosophy. It was a position informed by her (sometimes overpowering) erudition, but also by her profound spirituality. She onece described herself as 'too Jewish to be a Christian, and too Christian to be Jewish'. In fact on her deathbed she was received into the Anglican church. The very last stage of her journey was, according to the bishop who baptised her, an acceptance that in the person of Christ 'God was present in healing power'.



4. When she was still a teenager, Gillian Rose legally changed her last name from "Stone" to her stepfather's name, "Rose." She would henceforth be a Rose. Yet, at the same time, she would also remain a Stone, regardless of the legal ritual.
   
   For Gillian Rose, dying at a young age from a terrible cancer and trying, as the subtitle of her memoir suggests, to come to a "reckoning with life," the name change becomes a metaphor for what it means to be a human being. Life is a combination of jagged rocks which rip the flesh and weary the feet on the one hand, and the delicate aroma and beauty of roses on the other. It does no good to focus on one at the exclusion of the other. Such exclusivity is a delusion, and delusions always wind up being deflated by real life.
   
   Love's work, for Rose, is the earnest effort to embrace life, both its stones and its roses, in all its joyful and heartbreaking complexity. To be embodied, enfleshed, and at the same time capable of emotions and reason, is to inhabit a space in which one is continuously encountering transcendent moments that quickly get bounded by limitations of existence. But this dance between the two is what makes life so interesting, so worthwhile, and it is love's work to keep in the dance. As Rose writes (p. 105), "To grow in love-ability is to accept the boundaries of oneself and oneself, while remaining vulnerable, woundable, around the boundaries. Acknowledgement of conditionality is the only unconditionality of human love." Growing in love-ability is wondrous, but can also bring agony. And yet, concludes Rose, it's important to embrace both. Otherwise, one "dies deadly" rather than "dying forward into the intensified agon of living" (p. 77). In all this, one is reminded of Nietzsche's amor fati: loving one's life, the painful as well as the joyful, the tragic and the comic, the horrific and the sublime, because all of it IS one's life.
   
   Rose's style mirrors her conviction that live is a continuous interplay of stones and roses, and it can make for some difficulty at times in deciphering her meaning. Her writing is associative, one thought flowing into another, images cascading over themselves without warning. She moves effortlessly, for example, from a discussion of sanitation at Auschwitz to colostomies, from the divorce of her parents to her own dyslexia, from the AIDS that kills her friend Jim to reflections on Plato, Pascal, and Hume. But the patient reader will begin to cotton on to Rose's style. It may still remain difficult, but it will also reveal itself as exactly the right style for what she wants to say.
   
   "Keep your mind in hell, and despair not." This is the epigram Rose chooses for her book, and it's entirely appropriate. Note that the two clauses are connected by "and," not "but." Life isn't so much about "either/or" as it is about "and." Face life for what it is, which can frequently mean that one's mind is in a hellish place of fear, pain, suffering, loneliness (as Rose came to know only too well in her final months). But despair not, because the hell is part of life and in fact accentuates life's joy when it comes. Hell without despair: this is love's work.

2 comments about Leo Strauss: An Intellectual Biography.

1. 
   Daniel Tanguay has written what is perhaps the best introduction to Leo Strauss's philosophical journey, a book that should be helpful for anyone interested in Strauss's thought.
   
   At the beginning of the book's conclusion, Tanguay summarizes the book's main purpose:
   
   "The name of Leo Strauss is generally associated with the attempt to revive the quarrel between the ancients and the moderns and with the proposal for a return to ancient natural right in order to protect liberal society against the deviations introduced by relativism, radical historicism, and nihilism. We have sought to show that this theme certainly does not constitute the essential problem in Strauss's thought, which can be genuinely understood only to the extent to which it is put into relation with its central problem, that is, with the theologico-political problem. Strauss himself claimed that this was 'the' theme in his inquiries" (193).
   
   Defending liberal society and reviving the quarrel between the ancients and the moderns are certainly two of Strauss's aims, but his primary philosophical interest emerged in the 1920s, while he was studying Spinoza and experiencing the theologico-political problem firsthand as a Jew in interwar Germany. What is clear, however, is that the theologico-political problem goes far beyond `the Jewish Question' and extends beyond the Jewish world. The problem emerges in the tension between politics and religion and between theology and philosophy.
   
   Strauss originally sought to discover whether the philosophical critique of revelation, in its most radical, Enlightenment form, had succeeded, and he began a long study of the history of philosophy to find the sources and forms of the theologico-political problem. His journey took him from Spinoza, Hobbes, and Machiavelli back to Maimonides and the `Islamic Aristotelians'--especially Farabi--and in the process he rediscovered the art of esoteric writing. Tanguay does a fantastic job drawing out how Strauss's thought and writing style changed after this point, which Tanguay appropriately names `the Farabian turn.' Strauss's text "Farabi's `Plato'" emerges as one of the key documents for understanding his thought.
   
   Strauss moves after his reflections on Farabi to `the ancients'--specifically, the zetetic philosophy of Socrates and Plato, of the skeptic in the original, ancient meaning of the term--and explores the deepest conflict in Western intellectual history, the conflict between Jerusalem and Athens, a metaphor for the theologico-political problem. Strauss ultimately sought to revive the dispute between the two Western ways of life--between philosophy and revelation, between the life defined by philosophic eros and the search for wisdom and the life defined by the fear of God and obedience to the divine law.
   
   Leo Strauss has been getting a fair bit of bad press lately (and some good press as well). Reading the criticism, one gets the suspicion that, unlike Strauss's critics of the mid-20th century, his current critics have not actually bothered to read very much, if anything, of what he wrote. Before making political or character judgments about Strauss, it is probably prudent to seek for oneself what he thought and what he believed. This book can be useful here.
   
   Also, behind Professor Tanguay's exposition of Strauss's scholarship is the person of Strauss. While that is not Tanguay's main subject, it is extraordinary, reading this book, to see Strauss's personal struggle as he makes his intellectual journey. In his heart and mind he lived the conflict between Jerusalem and Athens, between his struggles with the Jewish tradition and his love of philosophy. I must admit that I felt a connection with Strauss when reading these parts of the book--after all, in the Jewish tradition, Israel/Yisrael can translate as `Godwrestler,' and Strauss wrestled with some of the most fundamental questions in both revelation and philosophy. It is also fascinating to read about Strauss's focus on the permanence of the questions of revelation and philosophy, and how cautious and reluctant he is to suggest sweeping solutions to them or to the theologico-political problem. The questions and problems are central for him, not the answers, and this attitude brings with it a certain nuance and what ultimately amounts to an invitation from Strauss, an invitation to study the questions, even though answers may ultimately elude our grasp.
   
   Daniel Tanguay deserves congratulations for writing this book. The biography is lucid, useful, and succinct, and Strauss's thought becomes more coherent after reading this book. It is probably helpful to have read some of Strauss's works before reading this book, but not all of them. Anyone approaching Strauss for the first time can probably get a sufficient introduction by reading Tanguay's biography and Thomas Pangle's edited volume, 'The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism,' which is also an excellent introduction to the main themes of Strauss's thoughts. Strauss's difficulty is often exaggerated, but it is true that it can at times be unclear what the guiding problems are for him. This book identifies and explores them, and can serve as a useful guide when reading Strauss. It is an extraordinary book.



2. Tanguay's superb book was originally written in 2003. That makes it the first major study that was written about Strauss in either English or French. In spite of my praise of the volumes written by the Zuckerts and Pangle, this is the best introduction to Strauss that I have yet to read. (If you can judge the quality of a philosopher by the quality of his/her interpreters, then Strauss was quite good.)
   The reason for the superiority of Tanguay's effort is ironic. His book is by far the most Straussian interpretation of Strauss. One of Strauss' basic hermeneutical principles was that the reader should first attempt to understand the author as the author understood himself (see pp. 2-4 of the intro for Tanguay's discussion on how he read Strauss). Strauss also emphasized the importance of reading an author while being "moved by the suspicion that perhaps his teaching contains the truth about the Whole" (p.3).
   I think that both the Zuckerts and Pangle are concerned about reading Strauss in such a way as to deflect somewhat his implied critique of the American regime. Tanguay doesn't care about that and that allows him to present some of the edges of Strauss' thought more sharply.
   Tanguay believes that the key to understanding Strauss is his relentless focus on the theological-political issue. Strauss came to the issue early in his life as a Jew in Weimer Germany and his focus on that issue only sharpened. Tanguay is superb at examining the early texts of Strauss, e.g., Spinoza's Critique of Religion or Philosophy and Law, for how they mark the stages of development of Strauss thought on this issue. Tanguay focuses on the essay, Farabi's Plato, as a critical turning point in that development. Strauss' readings of some of the philosophers of the Medieval Enlightenment (Farabi, Maimonides, Halevi, etc.) led him both to a new understanding of Plato and to his famous theory of esoteric/exoteric levels of writing. ( By the way, this is one area where I disagree with Tanguay. He asserts throughout his book that at this point in his career that Strauss began to write esoterically. Dunderhead that I am, I just don't see it unless you limit the meaning of the idea. I do not believe that Tanguay really provides any examples of this in Strauss. If anyone who reads this believes they know of one, please comment. I need educating!)
   Tanguay is really good at drawing out all the unresolvable tensions that are to be found in Strauss' beloved Athens vs. Jerusalem problem nexus and his theological-political problem. Along the way Tanguay provides some remarkable insights about the way Strauss saw the philosophical tradition. Tanguay suggests that (in Strauss' reading) Plato's ideas are not metaphysical entities so much as philosophical issues. Thus the Idea of justice becomes the issue of "what is justice" or "how do we behave justly?" Regardless of whether this is the correct reading of Plato, it is a fascinating one and suggest some ways in which Strauss' thought might be usefully compared to someone normally held far from him, say, Dworkin.
   Another interesting point. Tanguay feels that Strauss does not quite see that to see the theological-political problem in terms of Athens-Jerusalem or in terms of revelation-philosophy is to place the issue solidly in a historical context. Socrates knew nothing (as far as I know) of Moses or of the giving of the Law (Torah) at Mt. Sinai. For us to see the problem in the light of this juxtaposition is to assume the superiority of our historical insight, something that Strauss would be loath to do (Tanguay's discussion starts on p.212 and, trust me, is far richer than my summary).
   Another small complaint I have with Tanguay is that he doesn't engage with Strauss' later writings. As suggested by the train of his own thought, in his later years, Strauss focused on his reading of the ancients, thinkers like Xenophon, Plato and Aristophanes. None of these later books are examined in Tanguay or, for that matter, in the Zuckerts or in Pangle.
   This is a small complaint about an excellent book. Tanguay has done us a great service in explicating a difficult and undervalued thinker. He is also a great stylist as a philosophy writer. [My title is a quote of his (p. 214) which perfectly summarizes one of Strauss' central insights]. I have read quite a few philosophers and historians of ideas and the good writers are few and far between. I look forward to reading Tanguay's next work regardless of subject matter.

4 comments about Aquinas: An Introduction to the Life and Work of the Great Medieval Thinker (Penguin Philosophy).

1. Father Copleston's book is an excellent introduction to the philosophy of St. Thomas. A man of great intellectual depth, Copleston's lucid style makes Aquinas good reading for both academic study and personal philosophical/spiritual enjoyment.



2. With no real schooling in our aptitude for philosophy, I couldn't follow Aquinas, although I've always been very interested in his ideas, especially his rational proofs of the existence of God. Fr. Copleston's book was immensely helpful. His writing style is clear and elegant. He avoids technical philosophical jargon whenever possible and illustrates difficult concepts with everyday, real life examples. He also does a thorough job of comparing and contrasting Aquinas and his major influence, Aristotle. On occasion Copleston remarks on how Aquinas differs from Kant and other more contemporary thinkers; I wish there had been a little more of that as well, but I imagine his multi-volume History of Philosophy covers all that in detail. I think this book is a fantastic place to start for anyone interested in Aquinas and Middle Ages philosophy in general.



3. I found the book to be well written and readable. Covering the major ideas of Aquinas while pointing out what was left out as well as contrasting his ideas with other philosophers. I would recommend it to anyone interested in learning about Aquinas' ideas.



4. This was not a trivial book, a real tour the force trying to sync with Aquinas thought and understand part of the Christian, more specifically Catholic, theology and dogmas. The philosophy of this dominican priest of the thirteen century is based in plain reasoning, focusing in great deal on the "questions of language". His four reasons for the existance of God, his reflections about evil, sin and soul were the most interesting to know in my case, although he has opinion on several other issues, like politics and society. All this search for knowlegde is developed on a medieval society, and it is important to be aware of that context in order to appreciate Aquinas thought, as historical or of metaphysical relevance.

5 comments about Machiavelli in Hell.

1. Let me say first that I did not find this book difficult to read or comprehend, as some reviewers have implied it might be. It was, and is, a scholarly work, but Grazia makes the material lively, interesting, and above all understandable. Each thread in the tapestry that he weaves around the life and philosophy of Niccolo (as he calls him throughout the entire work) is discussed separately but folded back into the whole at regular intervals.

   Grazia introduces us to Niccolo Machiavegli (Machiavelli in the Tuscan style) in Chapter 1, a figure often reviled in later ages. From Chapter 2 onward we are treated to an analysis of his works, political, social, and dramatic in the context of an overarching political philosophy. What I found most interesting about Machiavelli In Hell is the interleaving of Niccolo's life with this analysis. He becomes a person rather than the one-dimensional cutout we are often given in school texts - a man of feeling, ideals, and intelligence. With some persistence and careful reading you can it make through this book with a greater understanding of what Niccolo gave to later generations, or even his own. It is not a substitute for The Prince, The Art of War, or the Mandragola but an introduction.




2. I give this book an easy 5 stars. This is much less intimidating than many of Nicolo's own writings... De Grazia is interested in his subject, fun, and ultimately very sympathetic to Machiavelli. The book shows how Machiavelli was a poet, a lover, a (really good!) comic playwright, and a champion of democracy, in addition to being one of the founding fathers of political science. I've read the majority of Nicolo's surviving work, often in the Italian, and De Grazia truly portrays him as he was... a courtier after Castiglione's model who (even after his death) suffered more than his share of the "unremitting malice of fortune." READ IT!!!



3. To those of you looking for an easy read on Machiavelli, I recommend going somewhere else. This book isn't going to skimp on the scholarly side just to make it easier to read for others. This is an intelligent book for an intelligent reader. Grazia intricately weaves together the mindset of Machiavelli as we see him through his many works and letters to friends.
   
   At first I was a little disappointed, perhaps because I was looking more for the momentous doings of Machiavelli. Yet, as I worked through the sheer volume of this biography (not by number of pages, yet rather by the number of words per page) I began to grow and respect Grazia as I slowly began to realize who Machiavelli was and how his thoughts and ideas influenced so many. His thoughts are his astounding accomplishments and those we certainly see here.
   
   For those interested in reading an intellectual book, definitely read this one. Machiavelli always believed that a person becomes a learned person through reading. For someone who agrees with this mindset I would wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone that has intelligence enough to want to learn rather than those readers who simply are looking for an easy read.



4. Da Grazia's intellectual, noetic style and sometimes peculiar authorial habits require some getting used to, but this is a decent, comprehensive, well-researched biography. I received my copy as a Christmas gift, and I do not regret taking the time to read it. Having done so, I feel like I know much more about the famous author of "The Prince" (which, I suppose, many folks used to have to study in school "way back when"), as well as much more about Machiavelli's unique circumstances, historical milieu, and overall literary output. Da Grazia, who I understand is an academic scholar, does a good job of putting a sympathetic, human face on his subject while simultaneously weaving together the disparate, rather derivative strands of influence and interesting life experiences that resulted in the incremental development of Machiavelli's reasoned and subsequently highly influential political/moral paradigm.
   
   However, I was a bit surprised and unsettled to learn that this biography was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1989. It's a good book, but, in my opinion, not that good! But, perhaps I am confused. I thought that standards were extremely stringent regarding such recognition, but maybe I am mistaken or somehow "old fashioned" and becoming increasingly clueless. Maybe the standards were tougher a few years ago and, like so much else, have since become somewhat "watered down". It seems, that in this day and age, in which so few people regularly read books of quality, much less write them, it's all just amounts to one more of those "signs of the times".



5. De Grazia's book on Machiavelli is an example of a kind of old-fashioned intellectual study one rarely finds these days: a close reading of the original texts--all of them, from "The Prince" to the least known of the letters--unencumbered by secondary sources and filled with arcane details that gradually build to a comprehensive and exacting overview of the man and his life. It is not an introduction for the uninitiated; rather, it's an explicative guide to all Machiavelli's works and a cohesive summary of the unique worldview imagined by this archetypal Renaissance man.
   
   More specifically, it tries to reconcile the goal (in political terms) of the "common good" pursued by the ideal ruler with the morality (in theological terms) of the "evil acts" this same ruler must sometimes perform to achieve this goal. In its crudest terms, the question is: How can the "good" (e.g., successful) prince avoid going to hell? "It is permissible to say good of evil," according to De Grazia's reading of Machiavelli, "if that evil is but seeming evil and converts to a true good." The qualities of such actions become "means, tools, instruments, detachable from the person using them." Nevertheless, the prince "has to steer a course between cruelty and compassion"; his action must be accompanied by "grace and glory." And in the end, the virtuous leader whose worth is misunderstood in this life will be rewarded in the afterlife; indeed, God prefers political action to spiritual activity.
   
   Along the way to reconciling Machiavelli's moral philosophy and his political philosophy, the author provides so much more: a solid biographical account of the episodes and experiences that influenced Machiavelli's thinking, the contemporary realpolitik that limited and often determined his advice to rulers and mentors, a portrait of the whimsical side of a man whose comic works have been neglected in recent decades (especially the farcical "Mandragola," a satire ripe for rediscovery).
   
   Overall, for a literary-biographical study of such picayune detail, De Grazia's work is surprisingly readable--and, at times, unexpectedly funny. But its one fault major is the total lack of an introductory outline of the book's somewhat meandering journey through Renaissance history, culture, metaphysics, and etymology; I fear that many otherwise interested fans of Machiavelli may give up after the chapter devoted to the single phrase "God more a friend to them than to you" in all its possible variations and meanings and interpretations. It's really quite unclear until much later where the author's arguments are headed or why they are important, and the organization of the book as a whole makes sense only after one has finished it.
   
   Still, if you're truly interested in what Machiavelli "meant" to his contemporaries (and especially if you are hunting for a book unscarred by the political axes wielded by many of his modern interpreters), this is probably the best study available.

2 comments about On Sartre (Wadsworth Philosophers Series).

1. I'm no expert on Sartre, but I decided to "review" this book because I found it a throughly enjoyable, informative and well-written introduction to the best known existentialist of the 20th Century.

   The book starts out with an introduction to Sartre and his place within existentialism. [pp. 1-6.] The second chapter is called "life and works" and is an excellent overview of Sartre's life which deals extensively with his literature and politics. [pp. 7-40.] The final chapters deal with Sartre's epistemology, ontology, psychology, and ethics. [pp. 41-95.] In these chapters, Prof. Kamber quotes extensively (but not excessively) from Sartre's works. The book contains equal amounts of praise and criticism and strikes me as fair and balanced. Although everything is cited, the book doesn't contain footnotes (which I find generally distract and aren't necessary in an introductory work).

   I have only a couple of criticisms of this work. First, Prof. Kamber is too easy on Sartre for his support of the Soviet Union. According to Prof. Kamber, Sartre did not break ties with the Soviet Union until the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. [p. 35.] Since the crimes of the Soviet Union were well-known (such as committing genocide in the Ukraine) one would think there would be no excuse for having any ties with such a government at any time. Why Sartre decided to offer at least partial support for years to a nation that committed crimes greater than Nazi Germany's is a question worthy of some discussion. Second, the book doesn't contain a list of recommended books about Sartre.

   Prof. Kamber clearly put a great deal of effort to make this book readable and informative. I recommend it highly.




2. Just finished this book. It was a very excellent summing up of the great one's work, and I especially enjoyed the author's personal takes and commentaries on Sartre's ideas. I really enjoyed reading it and learned a great deal even as I found my mind being refreshed with much of what I was taught years ago in courses on Existentialism. I found the writing to be quite fluid and the theses, summations, arguments and commentaries to be highly understandable and enjoyable to read. I discovered a great deal in the 'Life and Works' section that I had not known before, and the presentation of Sartre's defense of direct realism was very cogent. The author's section discussing Sartre on Nothingness was excellent, and I felt an old thrill running through me as I was re-acquainted with 'the theft of my world', 'le regard', 'shame and pride' and 'the body'. The 'Ontology' section really helped focus and clarify Sartre's ideas for me. The author's discussion of 'free will and determinism' and his presentation of Sartre's ideas on these concepts was excellent. That "the being of human beings is freedom", the concept of bad faith, Sartre on theology and ethics and humanistic Existentialism all made the blood rush to my ears. I had a lot of powerful feelings reading these wonderfully profound and moving insights again. I am quite taken with the author's final statement "Although I agree that obligation to others is central to ethics, I believe this focus needs to overlap with an ethic of self-realization. It would be a shame to lose sight of the imperative of Existentialism to confront our freedom and create ourselves." This speaks so much to us of how we should be "in the world". The author answers beautifully all those endless and careless remarks that are constantly being made by those with no knowledge of Existentialism, who use the word to infer a philosophy of despair, gloom and hopelessness. It is, as the author says, so much the opposite... what could be more stimulating, challenging, thrilling, promising and ultimately 'human' than confronting one's freedom and creating oneself? Could there be anything more important or meaningful in a human life? I want to thank the author for a wonderful book. It goes on my favorite bookshelf.

2 comments about On Rawls (Wadsworth Notes).

1. Talisse has written the best little introduction to Rawls I have read to date. While there is a sea of secondary writing on Rawls (much of it on my book shelves), for use in undergraduate courses in political philosophy or for use by the average reader who just wants to know where such notions and phrases as "veil of ignorance" and "difference principle" come from and what they are all about, none beats Talisse's concise exposition.



2. Having taken a course on the thought of John Rawls this semester, I was surprised by how often he repeated himself, restating his points over and over in formulations which varied only slightly. His work, Political Liberalism, in particular could have been significantly shorter if he had removed so much repetition. Understandably, it is a compilation of various lectures he delivered, but all the same, he could have edited them somewhat.
   
   That being the case, Robert Talisse, provides a fantastic introduction and summary to the thought of Rawls. He effectively places Rawls thought in the context it emerged from, and makes some of Rawls' more abstract concepts, much clearer.
   
   Rawls is worth reading if you want to understand many of the currents behind modern society, Talisse is worth reading to understand many of the currents behind and within Rawls.

No comments about Every Person's Guide to Jewish Philosophy and Philosophers.

5 comments about Bill W.: A Biography of Alcoholics Anonymous Cofounder Bill Wilson.

1. Of late, I have been doing a lot of research work and writing on the differences in religious views, religious background, and religious influences on A.A. co-founders Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith. In that connection, I have found myself turning more and more to Francis Hartigan's account and quoting portions of it in various contexts. The Bill Wilson story itself has been hacked around in so many ways, many of them inaccurate, that I look for the tidbits that show the author's real familiarity and lack thereof with the subject at hand. In Hartigan's case, I found his recital of the "spiritual experience" by Bill's grandfather, Hartigan's details on Lois Wilson, and Hartigan's accurate observations on Bill's decision for Christ at the Calvary Rescue Mission to be most refreshing and quotable. Among the plethora of recent books on Bill's life, I believe this Hartigan biography and the Bill W. Autobiography from the "Bedford Papers" as reported by Hazelden to be two important resources for learning A.A.'s historical, spiritual background. Dick B.



2. This is an amazing bio of Bill W.
   
   I've read pass it on and afew other AA related books, nothing has held my interest with such awe as this wonderful book.
   
   This book gives you a better understanding of Bill. Everyone has there own opinion.



3. The author went to work for Bill W's widow. Eventually this book resulted, after both were dead.
   
   The book provides a much needed perspective. It is clear on Bill's early atheism (which he called agnosticism) and helps focus how AA is a spiritual program and not a religious one and wny.
   
   Over and over again it explains the forces that were being reacted against. If you've listened to Bill and Charlie (they are available for free on the internet as mp3 downloads for ipods and similar products -- or your computer), this fills in the gaps.
   
   For example, everyone knows about Bill as a womanizer in his later years. What people do not know is that about the time he turned forty, his wife decided that she was done with sex. She was older than he was, went through menopause and retired from sex. No wonder that has he got into his fifties he started thinking of her more as a mother figure and less as a wife figure.
   
   In a modern hospital, such as where my wife works, everyone knows about "banana bags" (IVs that are yellow from the b-vitamins, especially niacin, used routinely on alcoholics who have serious problems because of bad diet) -- but I never knew that started with niacin for alcoholics.
   
   Or the rumors of financial misuse -- at complete odds with poverty and the audits -- now I know how they started and how they kept going.
   
   I'm not an alcoholic (well, I've never had a drink, so I'm at least a very dry alcoholic), though I've sent a number of clients to 12 step programs, until recently I did not have the slightest idea what they were about.
   
   With this I understand what makes AA different from every other program out there, why it found that balance and how it was shaped and touched by the personality of its founder.
   
   The book is an easy read, and gripping. I finished it over a weekend, along with other projects and preparing and teaching a Sunday School lesson.
   
   It was interesting, complex, consistent and had a basic appreciation and fondness for the subject.
   
   I'm not sure how it plays inside AA, but from the outside I find myself admiring Bill W and AA a great deal from having read this book. Heck, I even got started on the "Big Book" (I've read about half of it so far).
   
   If you've gotten to this page where the book is advertised, it is probably worth your while to buy it. I got my copy at half price books for six dollars. They had a bundle of them. Used copies in excellent to new condition abound.
   
   Buy it, read it, think about it. Well worth the read.



4. I've been a "friend" of Bill and Dr. Bob since Christmas 1990, and have read a lot of material, both "conference approved" and other, and this book is probably the best biography of Bill W. that I've come across. I have to disagree with the reviewers who gave this work a low rating... I do not see this biography as a "hatchet job" or any sort of attempt to demean or diminish the memory of Bill Wilson.
   
   Bill was not saint, and he never really sought sainthood. If some hold him to saintly standards or infallible behavior, those depictions were\are pressed on him.
   
   Hartigan successfully describes Bill's childhood, young adulthood, service years, marriage and the early years of AA's struggles in great detail. Until I read this book, I knew from other readings that Bill had many faults, but I did not fully appreciate the depth of his alcoholic behavior, and its effect on both Bill and Lois. I also did not appreciate the severity Bill's lifelong struggle with deep depression.
   
   This biography also does a good job putting context and details to Bill's lesser known "adventures" which folks hostile to AA use to discredit Bill and the AA program.
   
   Bill experimented with LSD, starting in the 50's and into the 60's... starting when the drug was legal and being investigated for psychotherapeutic potential to help alcoholics and schizophrenics.
   
   Bill actively promoted niacin for alcoholics, dragging the AA name into this promotion, but it was out of enthusiasm and hope to help the still suffering alcoholic. He was called to task for this, and the AA name removed from such endorsements.
   
   Bill was unfaithful to Lois and maintained long term relationships outside his marriage. This biography, written by the personal secretary to Lois at the end of her long life, makes no excuses for this behavior, but does add context.
   
   I came away with greater appreciation of Bill Wilson, the man, who overcame many serious problems to help create an organization that has helped many thousands of people live better lives.



5. Marital difficulties
   Wilson was serially unfaithful to his wife Lois. Wilson 's affairs with women caused controversy and concern within AA and it was common knowledge in New York AA circles. His interest in younger women increased with his age, and caused Barry Leach and other friends of Wilson to form a "Founders Watch". People were assigned to keep an eye on Wilson during the socializing that followed AA functions and to separate and steer away those young women who caught Wilson's interest. Wilson, like many in his generation, could be sexist, but he was also "capable of treating the women who worked with him with dignity and respect". In the mid 1950s he began an affair with Helen Wyn, a woman 22 years his junior, "in duration, intensity and scope" this was different from his other affairs. Wilson at one point discussed divorcing Lois to marry Helen. Wilson with determined perseverance was able to overcome the AA trustees objections, and renegotiated his royalty agreements with them in 1963, which allowed him to include Helen Wynn in his estate. He left 10% of his book royalties to Helen and the other 90% to his wife Lois. In 1968 with Wilson's illness making it harder for them to spend time together, Helen bought a house in Ireland.
   
   Alternative cures and spiritualism
   In the 1950s Wilson experimented with LSD in medically supervised experiments with Gerard Heard and Aldous Huxley. With Wilson's invitation his wife Lois, Father Dowling, and Nell Wing also participated in experimentation of this drug. Later Wilson wrote to Carl Jung, praising the results and recommending it as validation of Jung's spiritual experience. (The letter was not in fact sent as Jung had died.)
   
   At a parapsychology meeting in the 1960s, Wilson met Abram Hoffer and learned about the potential mood-stabilizing effects of niacin. Wilson was impressed with experiments indicating that alcoholics who were given niacin had a better sobriety rate, and he began to see niacin "as completing the third leg in the stool, the physical to complement the spiritual and emotional." Wilson also believed that niacin had given him relief from depression, and he promoted the vitamin within the AA community and with the National Institute of Mental Health as a treatment for schizophrenia. However, Wilson created a major furor in AA because he used the AA office and letterhead in his promotion.
   
   For Wilson, spiritualism (communicating with the spirits of the dead) was a life-long interest. One of his letters to his spiritual adviser Father Ed Dowling suggests that while Wilson was working on his book Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions he felt that spirits were helping him, in particular a 15th century monk named Boniface.[18] Wilson believed that the living could communicate with the dead and kept a "Spook Room" in his basement, where he along and others would conduct seances with a Ouijiboard, as well as experiment with automatic writing. Despite his conviction that he had evidence for the reality of the spiritual world, Wilson chose not to share this with AA.

5 comments about Simone de Beauvoir: A Biography.

1. The value of this biography is that it adds new facts andcorrects some of SdB's own mis- representations of her life. But it'stoo repetitive, often concentrating on insignficant chronologies of her trips, etc. Lacks sufficient explanation of the stultifying catholic education she rejected early in her life (was it guilt-inducing jansenistic sexophobia, the doctrine of a caring God, etc) or of the basic existentialist tenets which guided her life, such as the self-creating life project, absolute responsiblity for choices, etc. Badly in need of a final summing up chapter listing and analyzing the very disparate opinions about the contradictions and import of this amazing woman, eg was it unfathomable tenderness or simply self-delusion that enabled her to transform the ecstasy she felt with Nelson Algren into the sublimest and most poignant love affair? In many aspects of her life SdB could be a example for many women, but after reading this book one is still left wondering how and why.



2. Really, this book was a page-turner, a book of facts so well-written it made one want to know more, more, more, even when the knowing was almost painful out of de Beauvoir empathy. I wanted to read it as a companion to de Beauvoir's autobiographical series and was particularly grateful to Bair for pointing out incidents in which de Beauvoir "guilded the lily" when she recounted her own life. De Beauvoir's autobiography and this make perfect companions for a study on auto/biography and its subjectivication. (Also see Silent Woman by Janet Malcom.)

   I had read previous biographical material on de Beauvoir, but none I ever felt was so complete, and helped me to know her so well. I strongly recommend this as history, literary criticism, psychology and philosophy.




3. According to Claude Lanzmann there are several major errors which do occur in Bairs book, and basically it's gives a rotten and unworthy presentation of de Beauvoirs life and work.

   /Leah Greber




4. Bair works really hard at making it clear that Sartre and De Beauvoir were two sides of the same coin. Larger than life as always but deeply and painfully human too. Despite the eventual demise of their "professional" relationship, and the eventual move of Sartre to study Flaubert and De Beauvior to her feminist crusade, the two are inextricably linked. Did she really have as much control (specially in the end) over Sartre and his life? We will never know. What Bair does though is succeed in making her human more than all of De Beauvior's work ever could. Despite the fact that De Beauvior and Sartre are larger than life, and they always will be, Bair makes her subject - human, vulnerable and understandable. It is comprehensive and exhaustive journey (despite whatever errors there might be), one worth taking at any junction in the readers Existential journey.
   
   Miguel Llora



5. Turgid. There is no question this book is based on genuine and scholarly research. But the ordinary but informed reader is better leaving this one to the academicians.

5 comments about Letters : 1925-1975.

1. Perhaps it's a sign of the times in which we live, but the biggest stories of recent note in philosophy have been Heidegger's flirtation with National Socialism and the revelation of his affair with his student, Hannah Arendt, in the 1920s. The affair with Arendt has left a bad account of the affair (Ettinger) and a badly written novel in its wake, but perhaps these lumps of fool's gold have led us to the real thing, for they helped persuade Heidegger's son, Herman, to open the private files of his famous father and release these letters to the public. These, along with the letters to Arendt that are extant, comprise a volume that belongs in the library of every serious student of Arendt and Heidegger. It provides a glimpse of the lives and thought of two intellectual giants and of how events led to their estrangement and shaky reconciliation.

   The first part of the book comes across as a one-way conversation, as only Heidegger's letters to Arendt are extant. Obviously Heidegger was smart enough to destroy Arendt's letters lest they fall into the hands of Mrs. H. The tone of these early letters is that of a besotted adolescent. Heidegger sends her bad poetry and, in one letter, refers to her as his "little wood nymph." As these letters were meant to be strictly private, we cannot help but suffer the embarrassment of an unintentional voyeur. However, the section ends on an ominous note with a letter from Heidegger in 1933 answering Arendt's charges that he is anti-Semitic. This came shortly after the ascension of Hitler and makes us sad that Heidegger destroyed Arendt's letter making the charges.

   The correspondence begins anew after the war and only because Arendt saw it in her heart to forgive her former mentor and in effect bury the hatchet. Heidegger seems most pleased and the letters lead to a personal reconciliation with Arendt visiting Heidegger and his wife in Germany. But all was not to remain quiet. Heidegger had confessed all to his wife, and took her willingness to see Arendt again as a sign all was back to normal, as it were. The letters he sends in 1950 give the impression that he is more than willing to resume their affair; to once again have his cake and eat it, too. But a sudden dispatch from Heidegger warns Arendt to cancel a postponed visit and not to write for a while. Seems Elfride Heidegger was not the willing accomplice her husband believed her to be.

   But time heals all and the letters (and visits) resume. Heidegger is more interested in what he is doing and the American response than in what Arendt is doing. In one telling letter, he admits he has no idea of what she means by "radical evil." Another subject on which Arendt treads lightly is that of Karl Jaspers: Jaspers and Heidegger attempted a reconciliation after the war, but failed and each has bitterness toward the other with Arendt playing the diplomat in the middle, though in her letters with Jaspers there is no doubt about whose side she is on.

   Another missed opportunity is the sudden death of Merleau-Ponty a few months before he was to meet Heidegger in Marburg. Arendt has a higher opinion of him than does Heidegger, although in a philosophical debate I'd place my money on Merleau-Ponty, whose forays into aesthetics, ontology and physics expose Heidegger as stuck in a neo-Kantian continuum.

   All in all, this is the book students of these two intellectual giants have waited for, and I, for one was not disappointed in the least.




2. This collection of letters is an absolute necessity for anyone interested in Hannah Arendt, and particularly her relationship with the controversial German philosopher (and mentor) Martin Heidegger. The letters are well annotated and there is a helpful introduction as well. The only problem is that there are relatively few letters from Arendt. And those that appear in the collection are somewhat concise, whether from the editing or simply because they were not extensive. As a result, the reader does not get the intimate and expansive view into Arendt's thinking and activities that one comes away with from reading, for example, her collection of letters to and from Mary McCarthy. Of particular interest is the exchange of poetry between the two--somewhat ironic given Heidegger's controversial career and purported anti-Semitism during the Nazi period. One cannot help thinking, as the letters pass by, as to why Arendt chose to treat Heidegger with such kid gloves; nonetheless, there is a touching quality about this late-in-life correspondence of two former lovers. Quite pleasant and informative and not overly technical in philosophical terms.



3. Everybody knows what two people in a situation like Hannah Arendt and Martin Heidegger in 1925, a female student and a married philosophy professor, shouldn't say to each other. With imaginary docudramas filling in the blanks of the lives of so many famous people in ways that fulfill the fantasies of millions of TV viewers, as well as the readers of historical novels, those who watch movies about Samson, and theologians who wonder what Adam and Eve ever saw in the forbidden fruit, it is a relief to be getting some actual documents from a famous romance. Heidegger's fame was growing rapidly at the beginning of this book, and Hannah Arendt was bound to become known for paying attention. The fiftieth item in this book, "Martin Heidegger for Hannah Arendt: Five Poems," ends with the short poems:
   
   Correspondence
   
   Godless is God
   alone, and no
   other thing--
   death first
   corresponds,
   to the ring
   of Being's poem,
   the first.
   
   DEATH
   
   Death is, in the world's own rhyme,
   Being's mountain chain.
   Death will evade what's yours and mine
   in the falling weight
   falling toward silence's tor,
   star of earth, nothing more.
   
   For the friend's friend (pp. 63-64, prior to a letter dated Febr. 15, 1950).
   
   Hannah Arendt responded in item 127, twenty years later, a few weeks after Heidegger sent her a poem about time, but trying to quote the earlier poem, from New York, on November 27, 1970:
   
   Dear Martin,
   For days, weeks, I have wanted to write to you, at least to tell you how much good your letter did me, your sympathy, the time poem as an aid to reflection. Together with the other from many, many years ago
   
   Death is, in the world's design,
   Being's mountain chain.
   Death will evade what's yours and mine
   In the falling weight.
   Falling toward silence's tor,
   Star of earth, nothing more. (p. 173).
   
   British users of the English language might know that tor is a hill. Heinrich Blucher had died and a memorial service was held at Bard College on November 15. Like soldiers in a time of mounting casualties, people of different ages often have unsettled feelings about death because which will survive is not obvious. Hannah Arendt died in December, 1975, a few months before Heidegger's death in May, 1976. The `Romeo and Juliet' ending of fifty years of being German, Jewish, or American thinkers, bound together by an interest in the years that offered multiple lessons to be learned on both sides, makes this a bit more interesting to me than the other collections of Hannah Arendt's Letters with Karl Jaspers, Mary McCarthy, Hermann Broch, Kurt Blumenfeld, and Heinrich Blucher.
   
   This book mentions Nietzsche or Heidegger's book about Nietzsche about a dozen times, but the interesting comments are in Hannah Arendt's tribute, "Martin Heidegger at eighty" on pages 148-162, and a brilliant short description of Heidegger as a fox in July 1953 which ends with:
   
   But the fox living in the trap said proudly: So many fall into my trap; I have become the best of all foxes. And there was even something true in that: nobody knows the trap business better than he who has been sitting in a trap all his life. (p. 305).
   
   Most of us could apply the trap business view to everything in life that requires our involvement. Longing for a few ideas, we can pick up a book like this as the inside and outside view of an intellectual trap. Lacking the ability to read this book all at once, I had bookmarks in several places for weeks at a time as my ability to comprehend was expanding to get a grip on what this book has to offer. The Index is helpful for those who have particular interests. Minor items like Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor are not to be found in the Index, however much it might have been on Heidegger's mind when he wrote his letter of April 12, 1950, listing Beethoven, opus 111 Adagio, Conclusion as an addressee on page 74 and thanking Hannah for the opportunity to listen to it:
   
   "And now, Hannah, you have, on top of everything, and with a loving word, also given me Beethoven's Opus 111. Its sound has already become kin to the light I mentioned at the beginning of this letter.
   
   "Elfride returns your greeting and kiss with a happy heart and is glad you returned home safely. Say hello to your dear husband from me." (p. 76).
   
   The index does not have an entry for Elfride Heidegger on page 76, but it did list page 74, where Heidegger wrote about "what is loving about love that cast its light into my room when Elfride and you embraced. We will need time to make what has become of us our own: That you came, that what grew close in us became the closest closeness; that Elfride was helpful with all of it, that our love needs her love; that everything, including your safe return home, is reflected, clarified, and validated in everything else."
   
   I'm sure that Nietzsche wrote that a married philosopher, like Socrates, ought to be cast in some comedy, as Aristophanes did with Socrates in `The Clouds' in 423 B.C., a comedy which placed last in the competition with Cratinous and Ameipsias at the Great Dionysia in the month of March, 423 B.C. Fortunately, Aristophanes revised his comedy, so "The Clouds' that we have today, "as purely farcical as the presentation of the philosopher himself suspended in a basket betwixt heaven and earth" in the notes for the Rogers translation, might be much better than running through it the first time. Heidegger's opportunity in these LETTERS to get himself right all over again after five half decades had passed has a miraculous quality, to say the least.



4. Most of the material in this correspondence between Martin Heidegger and Hannah Arendt shouldn't come as much of a surprise to most students who are familiar with these great thinkers's respective work. Although, there is surprisingly little discussion of the unfortunate political situation of Heidegger, I suppose the de-Nazification trials exhausted the subject. Still, this is a nice collection of letters; what unfolds are the painful vicissitudes of their affair, and the almost complete destruction of their (and their families) lives on account of WWII. What is a pleasure to read here, however, is Heidegger's casual remarks on his serious philosophical projects, it provides an excellent window into his craft. One reaction, though it hardly comes as a surprise: Heidegger was a terrible poet. For example:
   
   "SONATA SONANS"
   What rang rings.
   It sinks
   Into lament's unknown ware's
   Sings into what no one dares,
   What's formed from the wreath,
   Takes place,
   Gentle's love and woe
   Into the Same.
   
   Etc. Etc.
   
   Perhaps the most problematic aspect of this collection is (at least for me), that it turns the reader into a creepy voyeur who peers into these personal love letters. Still, there is enough scholarly material contained within for scholars and students to make it a worthwhile collection.



5. This collection of letters is as one- sided as the relationship between Heidegger and Arendt was in certain respects. In this collection Heidegger is the one who speaks, over three - fourths of the one- hundred sixty- six letters are his. We do not have key documents, Arendt's early letters to Heidegger which were destroyed either by Heidegger himself or a member of his family.
   The relationship in the first stage at Marburg in 1925 was of the great intellectual figure Heidegger, already a person of tremendous reputation, thirty- five married with children, and that of an eighteen old student worshipper. The illicit love affair was clearly passionate and deeply felt on both sides.
   However in little more than a year there are signs that he does not mind her going out with a fellow student,and off to study somewhere else a sign perhaps of his being troubled that the affair exposed might cause harm to his reputation.
   A second stage came with the rise of the Nazis to power , Arendt's exile, and Heidegger's becoming a collaborator with the Nazi regime. At this stage Arendt becomes disturbed about allegations of Heidegger's anti- Semitism.
   The third stage came after a long hiatus in letter - writing. It was only after the war that there was a renewal of their relationship, though it is not clear that this was also a romantic renewal. For by this time Arendt was married to Heinrich Blucher. At this point Arendt played the role of advisor to Heidegger in helping him deal with the charges of collaboration with the Nazis. This chapter is not one which does Arendt credit. Her readiness to not simply excuse Heidegger for his revolting behavior, (including anti- Semitic remarks, dismissal of Jewish colleagues, a use of concepts of his own philosophy in a pro- Nazi speech, ) but to help him get off the hook reflects a loyalty void of all judgment. And this from the philosopher for whom 'judging' was a fundamental philosophical category.
   Their post- war reconciliation was prompted and pushed by Heidegger's viciously anti- Semitic wife, Elfreide. Elfreide despised Arendt but understood that she could help Heidegger, and so encouraged the renewal of the relationship. Heidegger for his part never read Arendt's work and could not give her the kind of respect and esteem that she continued to give him.
   Heidegger and Arendt are profound souls, and this is felt in the content and tone of these letters. They are people of high ideals and aspirations. They are two of the most significant thinkers of the twentieth century. Their story of love and friendship is a fascinating one. And whatever additional light is thrown on this relationship is eagerly seized upon by students of their work. Yet their relationship illicit at the outset , later became even more suspect as it worked to cover up Heidegger's immoral behavior. The dishonesty and evasiseness of Heidegger in dealing with the charges against him is all the more reprehensible as it is that of one whose fundamental enterprise is in striving for Truth.Arendt's excess of caring to protect Heidegger are in painful and troubling contrast with her insensitity to survivors of the Shoah, this of course in her famous 'banality of evil' analysis of the action of Eichmann. Her tone in ' Eichmann in Jerusalem' was contemptuous and superior, a tone she might too have learned from Heidegger. There are those who claim that the final phase of the Heidegger- Arendt relationship involved a reversal in which she was the powerful one and he the one more needing and enslaved. But these letters do not seem to bear this out. Her loyalty to him and love enabled her to continue serving him too well to the end of their days. She died in the latter half of 1976 and he only six months later.
   
   .