Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger was an important and controversial philosopher of the 20th century. His major work was Being and Time, published in 1927.
He’s a difficult figure, not only because his writing can appear extremely obscure and convoluted, but also because he was a member of the National Socialist Party, and at times supported Hitler. He’s very complex and some people have even suggested there are connections between his philosophical stance and Nazism.
“He writes about technology, he writes about our relationship with the physical world and the way that the human being is embedded in the planet Earth. He was one of the first to unpack some of Nietzsche’s critical thinking about the received ideas of philosophy, and to set off in a completely new direction. He also wrote about many existentialist themes that Sartre would then pick up on.” Sarah Bakewell recommending books about existentialism.
Books by Martin Heidegger
“There was a very real initial intimacy when Heidegger was a professor and married man of 36, and Arendt his 18-year-old student. Then came years following a dramatic separation as Heidegger rose to academic prominence in Germany during the Nazi regime, while Arendt fled to America. In the postwar years, they reached the height of their popularity as thinkers, and kept up the correspondence. There is much profound philosophical thinking here, but also an incredible space of almost poetic intimacy.” Read more...
The Best Literary Letter Collections
Lucas Zwirner, Artists & Art Critic
“Heidegger gives us the analytical tools for understanding human existence in the world. If you begin philosophy from that starting point, it fundamentally changes the way that you understand the activity. It’s not about sense data pouring into eyes, and minds inside heads which might or might not be attached to brains, all of that is just left by the wayside. We’re out there, with things, with stuff, and that makes sense. How does it make sense, how does it hang together, and what can we say about it?” Read more...
The best books on Continental Philosophy
Simon Critchley, Philosopher
Interviews where books by Martin Heidegger were recommended
The best books on Continental Philosophy, recommended by Simon Critchley
What is the nature of human existence in the world? What should philosophy be concerned with as a discipline? Philosopher Simon Critchley introduces us to the landscape of continental philosophy.
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1
Letters to a Young Painter
by Rainer Maria Rilke -
2
The Death and Letters of Alice James: Selected Correspondence
by Alice James -
3
Letters to Felice
by Franz Kafka -
4
Letters: 1925-1975
by Hannah Arendt & Martin Heidegger -
5
Words in Air: The Complete Correspondence
by Elizabeth Bishop & Robert Lowell
The Best Literary Letter Collections, recommended by Lucas Zwirner
The Best Literary Letter Collections, recommended by Lucas Zwirner
The next release in the ekphrasis series from David Zwirner Books is Oscar Wilde’s The Critic as Artist, including an introduction by Michael Bracewell and a colour portrait of Wilde by Marlene Dumas. Head of Content Lucas Zwirner talks to Five Books about the inspiration he’s drawn from literary letters and how they inform the editorial direction of the publishing house.
