Martin Heidegger's Changing Destinies: Catholicism, Revolution, Nazism

By: Guillaume Payen

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Synopsis: A portrait of Martin Heidegger as a man and a philosopher In this biography of Martin Heidegger (1889–1976), now available in English, historian Guillaume Payen synthesizes the connections between the German philosopher&’s life and work. Critically, but without polemics, he creates a portrait of Heidegger in his time, using all available sources—lectures, letters, and the notorious &“black notebooks.&” Payen chronicles Heidegger&’s &“changing destinies&”: after the First World War, an uncompromising Catholicism gave way to a vigorous striving for a philosophical revolution—fertile ground for National Socialism. The book reflects a life of light and shadow. Heidegger was a great philosopher and teacher who cultivated friendships and love affairs with Jews but also was an anti-Semitic nationalist who lamented the &“Judaization of German intellectual life.&”