With her discovery that HannahArendt wrote her masterpiece, The Origins of Totalitarianism, years earlier than previously thought-well before World War II and anticipating the horrors of Nazism-Michelle-Irene Brudny overturns traditional Arendt scholarship. Based on that groundbreaking discovery, in Hannah Arendt Brudny rejects the claim that Arendt is primarily a polemical writer and shows instead that she was a true visionary.
In this first intellectual biography of Arendt, Brudny traces the development of Arendt's philosophy, showing her wide-ranging interests and her intellectual growth. She clearly delineates the influence of Arendt's philosophy teacher and lover, Martin Heidegger, and illuminates Arendt's complex relationship with Judaism-which Arendt never saw as her "repellant doppelganger," as has been sometimes said. Brudny also examines the importance of Arendt's American years-an area that, until now, has been little explored.
The writings and philosophies of Hannah Arendt have never been more relevant, especially in the context of today's violence and barbarism. With fascinating details about her life and her influence on contemporary philosophy, this brief biography-one of only two Arendt biographies available in English-is an excellent guide to the life and work of one of the twentieth century's most important thinkers.
Michelle-Irene Brudny is a philosopher and American studies professor at the University of Rouen. She is one of a team of scholars charged with editing and publishing Hannah Arendt's posthumous work.
