Wolfram Eilenberger is an internationally bestselling author and philosopher. He is the founding editor of Philosophie Magazin and hosts the television program Sternstunde Philosophie on the Swiss public broadcasting network SRF. In 2018, he published Time of the Magicians in Germany. The book instantly became a bestseller there, as well as in Italy and Spain, and won the prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger in France. It has been translated into more than twenty languages. Eilenberger has been a prolific contributor of essays and articles to many publications, among them Die Zeit, Der Spiegel, and Cicero, and has taught at the University of Toronto, Indiana University Bloomington, and Berlin University of the Arts.
“Splendid.” —Financial Times
“[Eilenberger] patiently draws these four intellectual magi out of
the shadows of their writings, which often tend toward complete
opacity. The result is not a book of academic philosophy but rather
an intellectual history that largely succeeds in bringing
philosophy to life.” —The New York Times Book Review
“Wolfram Eilenberger’s survey of high thoughts and low politics
among German-language philosophers of the 1920s is a salutary tale
for today, not just a gripping panorama of century-old dreams and
feuds . . . Eilenberger shows flair in knitting complex ideas
into the fabric of his sages’ lives and times.” —The
Economist
“[A] vibrant group portrait of four philosophers during a
turbulent decade . . . Eilenberger is a terrific storyteller,
unearthing vivid details that show how the philosophies of these
men weren’t the arid products of abstract speculation but vitally
connected to their temperaments and experiences.” —Jennifer Szalai,
The New York Times
“[A] fascinating and accessible account . . . In his
entertaining book, Mr. Eilenberger shows that his magicians’
thoughts are still worth collecting, even if, with hindsight, we
can see that some performed too many intellectual conjuring
tricks.” —The Wall Street Journal
“A group portrait of four brilliant young philosophers in the
aftermath of the first world war . . . Eilenberger tells it with
free-wheeling gusto.” —The Guardian
“A tremendous feat of scholarship, but more pertinently it is also
a technical masterpiece, knitting together the four men's love
lives, money troubles, ontological anxieties and the wider ferment
of the Weimar republic with uncommon dexterity.” —The Times
(London)
“Eilenberger weaves together the biographies and the developing
thought of the four philosophers with great bravura and wit. We get
a strong sense of their thought emerging as a response to the
enveloping chaos of the time, when all the old certainties were
crumbling . . . It’s a riveting read that sheds light on a crucial
period in European history and thought, with some uncanny parallels
to our own time.” —The Telegraph
“Eilenberger clearly lays out the evolving theories of each
philosopher for a non-specialist audience, embedding the
philosophical discussion in their often-dramatic professional and
romantic lives and the rapidly evolving social worlds that they
shared. The result is an engrossing history which also acts as an
introduction to post-WWI European philosophical thinking.”
—Booklist
“Fluently blending biography with intellectual history, Time of the
Magicians reveals catastrophe as the mother of modern philosophy.
It is hard to imagine a more bracing way to reflect on our own
times.” —Pankaj Mishra
“[T]his comprehensive and well-informed treatment deserves credit
for bringing four major philosophers down from the heights of
abstraction.” —Publishers Weekly
“An exemplary work . . . [Eilenberger's] lucid presentation of his
characters’ often hard-to-comprehend thinking and the muddy
language in which they expressed it make this book invaluable for
anyone seeking to learn about these extraordinary
figures.” —Kirkus (starred review)
“Spirited [. . .] this comprehensive and well-informed
treatment deserves credit for bringing four major philosophers down
from the heights of abstraction.” —Publishers Weekly
“A fascinating tour through the lives and thought of some of the
most challenging philosophers of the twentieth century: Benjamin,
Cassirer, and those two matching gnomic magi, Wittgenstein and
Heidegger. It is a book of riches, full of stories as well as
ideas, all brought together with a fine, light touch.” —Sarah
Bakewell, author of How to Live: Or A Life of Montaigne in One
Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer
“Time of the Magicians is escapism at its ambitious best: a
portrait of four fascinating personalities, a chronicle of a
pivotal decade in world history, and an introduction to some of the
20th century's most important philosophers. Wolfram Eilenberger has
written a must-read for those who love history, philosophy, or
gripping storytelling.” —Yascha Mounk, author of The People
vs. Democracy: Why Our Freedom Is in Danger and How to Save It
“A tour de force . . . Eilenberger’s beautifully
written history of the pivotal decade in 20th century metaphysics
is as hard to put down as a good novel. Yet Time of the Magicians
is more than first-rate history of philosophy. By weaving
together these four philosophers’ works and lives, and drawing
unexpected connections between their deepest concerns, Eilenberger
unfolds new paths for philosophy itself. This is an
extraordinary achievement.” —Susan Neiman, author of Learning from
the Germans: Race and the Memory of Evil
“In this meticulously researched narrative, Wolfram Eilenberger
brings to life the intertwining fates of four of the 20th
century's most influential thinkers, illuminating their ideas as
well as helping to explain the era they inhabited. Packed with
personal stories as well as erudition, this is a book that teaches
us both how to live through a time of crisis, and how to think
about it—skills we now need once again.” —Anne Applebaum, Pulitzer
Prize winning-author of Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure
of Authoritarianism and Gulag: A History
“New times bring new disasters—and new disasters bring new ways of
thinking. Wolfram Eilenberger's Time of the Magicians recalls an
age when philosophers reinvented a world in full meltdown—a world
that needed to be remade down to its very punctuation. He makes
difficult concepts accessible without dumbing them down, and turns
famous names into unforgettably human—all too human—characters.”
—Benjamin Moser, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Sontag: Her Life
and Work
“Wolfram Eilenberger mixes history and biography to produce
something truly unusual: a page-turning book about philosophy, told
through the lives of four of its most controversial and
confounding figures. Their lives were in many cases as chaotic
as their work was profound, but he brings them all to life on the
page with passion and clarity. Time of the Magicians is both an
education and a delight.” —Ruth Franklin, author of Shirley
Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life
“A vivid, rich and beautifully narrated book. It describes a
remarkable intellectual constellation—four different ways of life
and four answers to the question: What is human?” —Rüdiger
Safranski
"Wolfram Eilenberger . . . saves the wonder of philosophy, takes
away the fear of the incomprehensible. He does not take sides, but
he simply let the different approaches coexist, this is his
capacity! He makes it fun to read about every of each four
philosophers.” —Süddeutsche Zeitung
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