EAN: 9780525559665

TIME OF THE MAGICIANS - WOLFRAM EILENBERGER GEB...

[A] fascinating and accessible account . . . In his entertaining book  Mr. Eilenberger shows
that his magicians thoughts are still worth collecting  even if  with hindsight  we can see
that some performed too many intellectual conjuring tricks. Wall Street JournalA grand
narrative of the intertwining lives of Walter Benjamin  Martin Heidegger  Ludwig Wittgenstein 
and Ernst Cassirer  major philosophers whose ideas shaped the twentieth centuryThe year is
1919. The horror of the First World War is fresh for the protagonists of Time of the Magicians
each of whom finds himself at a crucial juncture. Benjamin is trying to flee his overbearing
father and floundering in his academic career  living hand to mouth as a critic. Wittgenstein 
by contrast  has dramatically decided to divest himself of the monumental fortune he stands to
inherit  in search of spiritual clarity. Meanwhile  Heidegger  having managed to avoid combat
in war by serving as a meteorologist  is carefully cultivating his career. Finally  Cassirer is
working furiously on the margins of academia  applying himself 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 as the Second
World War looms on the horizon  their fates will be very different.

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