p. 1

[close]

p. 2

hannah arendt hannah arendt s work offers a powerful critical engagement with the cultural and philosophical crises of mid-twentieth-century europe her idea of the banality of evil made famous after her report on the trial of the nazi war criminal adolf eichmann remains controversial to this day in the face of 9/11 and the `war on terror arendt s work on the politics of freedom and the rights of man in a democratic state are especially relevant her impassioned plea for the creation of a public sphere through free critical thinking and dialogue provides a significant resource for contemporary thought covering her key ideas from the origins of totalitarianism and the human condition as well as some of her less well-known texts and focussing in detail on arendt s idea of storytelling this guide brings arendt s work into the twenty-first century while helping students to understand its urgent relevance for the contemporary world simon swift is lecturer in critical and cultural theory in the school of english at the university of leeds his research interests include kant romanticism aesthetics the philosophy of the enlightenment and critical theory he is the author of romanticism literature and philosophy expressive rationality in rousseau kant wollstonecraft and contemporary theory 2006

[close]

p. 3

routledge critical thinkers series editor robert eaglestone royal holloway university of london routledge critical thinkers is a series of accessible introductions to key figures in contemporary critical thought with a unique focus on historical and intellectual contexts the volumes in this series examine important theorists · significance · motivation · key ideas and their sources · impact on other thinkers concluding with extensively annotated guides to further reading routledge critical thinkers are the student s passport to today s most exciting critical thought already available theodor adorno by ross wilson louis althusser by luke ferretter roland barthes by graham allen jean baudrillard by richard j lane simone de beauvoir by ursula tidd homi k bhabha by david huddart maurice blanchot by ullrich haase and william large judith butler by sara salih gilles deleuze by claire colebrook jacques derrida by nicholas royle michel foucault by sara mills sigmund freud by pamela thurschwell antonio gramsci by steve jones

[close]

p. 4

stephen greenblatt by mark robson stuart hall by james procter martin heidegger by timothy clark fredric jameson by adam roberts jean-françois lyotard by simon malpas jacques lacan by sean homer julia kristeva by noëlle mcafee paul de man by martin mcquillan friedrich nietzsche by lee spinks paul ricoeur by karl simms edward said by bill ashcroft and pal ahluwalia gayatri chakravorty spivak by stephen morton paul virilio by ian james slavoj zizek by tony myers american theorists of the novel henry james lionel trilling wayne c booth by peter rawlings theorists of the modernist novel james joyce dorothy richardson virginia woolf by deborah parsons theorists of modernist poetry t.s eliot t e hulme ezra pound by rebecca beasley feminist film theorists laura mulvey kaja silverman teresade lauretis and barbara creed by shohini chaudhuri cyberculture theorists manuel castells and donna haraway by david bell for further details on this series see www.routledge.com/literature/series.asp

[close]

p. 5

[close]

p. 6

hannah arendt simon swift london and new york

[close]

p. 7

first published 2009 by routledge 2 park square milton park abingdon oxon ox14 4rn simultaneously published in the usa and canada by routledge 270 madison avenue new york ny 10016 routledge is an imprint of the taylor francis group an informa business this edition published in the taylor francis e-library 2008 to purchase your own copy of this or any of taylor francis or routledge s collection of thousands of ebooks please go to www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk © 2009 simon swift all rights reserved no part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented including photocopying and recording or in any information storage or retrieval system without permission in writing from the publishers british library cataloguing in publication data a catalogue record for this book is available from the british library library of congress cataloging-in-publication data swift simon hannah arendt simon swift p cm ­ routledge critical thinkers includes bibliographical references and index 1906-1975 i title ii series b945.a694s95 2008 320.5092­dc22 2008015953 isbn 0-203-88967-3 master e-book isbn isbn 10 0-415-42585-9 print edition isbn 13 978-0-415-42585-8 hbk isbn 10 0-415-42586-7 print edition isbn 13 978-0-415-42586-5 pbk isbn 10 0-203-88967-3 print edition isbn 13 978-0-203-88967-1 print edition ebk

[close]

p. 8

for leni

[close]

p. 9

[close]

p. 10

contents series editor s preface acknowledgements abbreviations x xiii xiv why arendt 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 biography theory and politics thinking and society acting labour work and modernism judging from kant to eichmann anti-semitism racism empire and nation totalitarianism coda evil after arendt further reading 1 8 19 32 44 55 66 77 87 98 101 112 works cited index 117 120

[close]

p. 11

series editor s preface the books in this series offer introductions to major critical thinkers who have influenced literary studies and the humanities the routledge critical thinkers series provides the books you can turn to first when a new name or concept appears in your studies each book will equip you to approach a key thinker s original texts by explaining her or his key ideas putting them into context and perhaps most importantly showing you why this thinker is considered to be significant the emphasis is on concise clearly written guides which do not presuppose a specialist knowledge although the focus is on particular figures the series stresses that no critical thinker ever existed in a vacuum but instead emerged from a broader intellectual cultural and social history finally these books will act as a bridge between you and the thinker s original texts not replacing them but rather complementing what she or he wrote these books are necessary for a number of reasons in his 1997 autobiography not entitled the literary critic frank kermode wrote of a time in the 1960s on beautiful summer lawns young people lay together all night recovering from their daytime exertions and listening to a troupe of balinese musicians under their blankets or their sleeping bags they would chat drowsily about the gurus of the time what they repeated was largely hearsay hence my lunch time suggestion quite impromptu for a series of short very cheap books offering authoritative but intelligible introductions to such figures there is still a need for `authoritative and intelligible introductions but this series reflects a different world from the 1960s new thinkers have emerged and the reputations of others have risen and fallen as new research has developed new methodologies and challenging ideas have spread through the arts and humanities the study of literature is no longer ­ if it ever was ­ simply the study and evaluation of poems novels and plays it is also the study of the ideas issues and difficulties which arise in any literary text and in its interpretation other arts and humanities subjects have changed in analogous ways with these changes new problems have emerged the ideas and issues behind these radical changes in the humanities are often presented without reference to wider contexts or as theories which you can simply `add on to the texts you read certainly there s nothing wrong with picking out selected ideas or using what comes to hand ­ indeed some thinkers have argued that this is in fact all we can do however it is sometimes forgotten that each new idea comes from the pattern and development of somebody s thought and it is important to study the range and context of their ideas against theories `floating in space the routledge critical thinkers series places key thinkers and their ideas firmly back in their contexts more than this these books reflect the need to go back to the thinker s own texts and ideas every interpretation of an idea even the most seemingly innocent one offers its own `spin implicitly or explicitly to read only books on a thinker rather than texts by

[close]

p. 12

that thinker is to deny yourself a chance of making up your own mind sometimes what makes a significant figure s work hard to approach is not so much its style or content as the feeling of not knowing where to start the purpose of these books is to give you a `way in by offering an accessible overview of these thinkers ideas and works and by guiding your further reading starting with each thinker s own texts to use a metaphor from the philosopher ludwig wittgenstein 1889­1951 these books are ladders to be thrown away after you have climbed to the next level not only then do they equip you to approach new ideas but also they empower you by leading you back to a theorist s own texts and encouraging you to develop your own informed opinions finally these books are necessary because just as intellectual needs have changed the education systems around the world ­ the contexts in which introductory books are usually read ­ have changed radically too what was suitable for the minority higher education system of the 1960s is not suitable for the larger wider more diverse hightechnology education systems of the twenty-first century these changes call not just for new up-to-date introductions but new methods of presentation the presentational aspects of routledge critical thinkers have been developed with today s students in mind each book in the series has a similar structure they begin with a section offering an overview of the life and ideas of each thinker and explain why she or he is important the central section of each book discusses the thinker s key ideas their context evolution and reception each book concludes with a survey of the thinker s impact outlining how their ideas have been taken up and developed by others in addition there is a detailed final section suggesting and describing books for further reading this is not a `tacked-on section but an integral part of each volume in the first part of this section you will find brief descriptions of the thinker s key works then following this information on the most useful critical works and in some cases on relevant websites this section will guide you in your reading enabling you to follow your interests and develop your own projects throughout each book references are given in what is known as the harvard system the author and the date of a work cited are given in the text and you can look up the full details in the bibliography at the back this offers a lot of information in very little space the books also explain technical terms and use boxes to describe events or ideas in more detail away from the main emphasis of the discussion boxes are also used at times to highlight definitions of terms frequently used or coined by a thinker in this way the boxes serve as a kind of glossary easily identified when flicking through the book the thinkers in the series are `critical for three reasons first they are examined in the light of subjects which involve criticism principally literary studies or english and cultural studies but also other disciplines which rely on the criticism of books ideas theories and unquestioned assumptions second they are critical because studying their work will provide you with a `toolkit for your own informed critical reading and thought which will make you critical third these thinkers are critical because they are

[close]

p. 13

crucially important they deal with ideas and questions which can overturn conventional understandings of the world of texts of everything we take for granted leaving us with a deeper understanding of what we already knew and with new ideas no introduction can tell you everything however by offering a way into critical thinking this series hopes to begin to engage you in an activity which is productive constructive and potentially life-changing.

[close]

p. 14

acknowledgements i want to thank bob eaglestone for his enthusiasm for this project from the start and aileen storry development editor for cultural studies at routledge for her patience throughout the composition i d also like to thank the school of english at leeds for granting the study leave that enabled me to finish this book friends and colleagues in the school who have inspired me throughout its composition are bridget bennet sam durrant and denis flannery this book would not have been possible without the love and support of heike.

[close]

p. 15

abbreviations full bibliographic references to the following texts published by arendt and posthumously published works can be found in the `works cited section bpf cr ej eu hc jw lkpp lm mdt or ot1/2/3 pp rv between past and future eight exercises in political thought crises of the republic eichmann in jerusalem a report on the banality of evil essays in understanding 1930­1954 formation exile and totalitarianism the human condition the jewish writings lectures on kant s political philosophy the life of the mind men in dark times on revolution the origins of totalitarianism volumes 1 2 and 3 `philosophy and politics rahel varnhagen the life of a jewess

[close]