Men In Dark Times

By Hannah Arendt

Essays on Karl Jaspers, Rosa Luxemburg, Pope John XXIII, Isak Dinesen, Bertolt Brecht, Randall Jarrell, and others whose lives and work illuminated the early part of the century. Index.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Mar 25, 1970
• ISBN: 9780547542058

Hannah Arendt

Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) is considered one of the most important and influential thinkers of the twentieth century. A political theorist and philosopher, she is also the author of Crises of the Republic, On Violence, The Life of the Mind, and Men in Dark Times. The Origins of Totalitarianism was first published in 1951.

Reviews for Men In Dark Times

[jonfaith · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

We humanize what is going on in the world and in ourselves only by speaking of it, and in the course of speaking of it we learn to be human.

This was a splendid book to tackle on a holiday. I had read the section on Walter Benjamin before and it was a treat t confront it again. The sections on Rosa Luxemburg and Bertolt Brecht were my favorites, though the piece on the poet Randall Jarrell was unexpectedly moving. Each of these portraits illuminate or fuel Arendt's notion of the public; the limits of this thought become uneasily befogged in practice where one must consider the point Brecht made: it is more important to do good, to make the world a better place than to simply be a good person. The anecdote is related that once Brecht was dining with Sidney Hooks and when asked about the Moscow Show Trial Brecht responded that if they were innocent of the charges then of course they should die. Ponder that, will you.