Peter Sloterdijk turns his keen eye to the history of western thought, conductin
g colorful readings of the lives and ideas of the world's most influential intel
lectuals. Featuring nineteen vignettes rich in personal characterizations and th
eoretical analysis, Sloterdijk's companionable volume casts the development of p
hilosophical thinking not as a buildup of compelling books and arguments but as
a lifelong, intimate struggle with intellectual and spiritual movements, filled
with as many pitfalls and derailments as transcendent breakthroughs.
Sloterdijk
delves into the work and times of Aristotle, Augustine, Bruno, Descartes, Fouca
ult, Fichte, Hegel, Husserl, Kant, Kierkegaard, Leibniz, Marx, Nietzsche, Pascal
, Plato, Sartre, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Wittgenstein. He provocatively jux
taposes Plato against shamanism and Marx against Gnosticism, revealing both the
vital external influences shaping these intellectuals' thought and the excitemen
t and wonder generated by the application of their thinking in the real world.
