Basic Writings: From Being and Time (1927) to the Task of Thinking (1964)

This volume, published by HarperCollins in the sixties and edited by translator David Farrell Krell serves as the perfect compendium to the thought of Martin Heidegger, one of the most significant thinkers of philosophy in the 20th century. Heidegger's methodology is necessarily difficult, as he is trying to remove himself from the `average-everyday' language we employ; and he is trying to approach the meaning of being concretely and originally. Therefore, stop complaining about the obscurity of his style and work your way through this text, for it will remain one of the major works of European thought. The first essay is the introductory chapter to Heidegger's opus Being and Time. It is actually rather senseless to read it without going on to read the complete text. However, for those readers who simply want a taste of Heidegger's basic philosophic project and methodology, it is summarized here. He says at the outset: "This question has today been forgotten-although our time considers itself progressive in again affirming `metaphysics.' All the same we believe that we are spared the exertion of rekindling a gigantomachia peri tes ousias [a Battle of Giants concerning Being,' [Plato, Sophist]. But the question touched upon here is hardly an arbitrary one." (41). For Heidegger, philosophy has lost touched with the question `what is the meaning of being, as such?' However, in order to resolve the question of the meaning of Being, you must examine the Being of the questioner, (Dasein), leading us to do fundamental ontology. The second essay in the collection is titled What is Metaphysics? It is an inaugural address the delimited many of the major ideas he would later expand in Being in Time. In it, Heidegger again examines the meaning of Being, but he also discusses the unheimlichkeit (the uncanny), and Dasein's confrontation with "the nothing" (100), and with attunement and Nihilism generally. This is a particularly famous, though cryptic essay, the major ideas in it are expanded at great lengths by Heidegger in his book `Introduction to Metaphysics,' published later in 1953. The next essay is titled On the Essence of Truth, and it is particularly difficult. Heidegger begins with: "Our Topic is the essence of truth. The question regarding the essence of truth is not concerned with whether truth is a truth of practical experience or of economic calculation, the truth of a technical consideration or of political sagacity, or, in particular, a truth of scientific research or of artistic composition, or even the truth of thoughtful reflection or cultic belief. The question of essence disregards all this and attends to the one thing that in general distinguishes every `truth' as truth (115). Heidegger will later suggest in the essay that the essence of truth is freedom, or unconcealment. Heidegger does not adhere to radical skepticism, nor does he believe in eternal truths. He is interested in the essence of this question with regard to Da-Sein's

This is a good place to start if you are interested in getting an overview of Heidegger's writings. There are some obvious disadvantages such as the fact that some parts are included while others are not, but what is inside is generally good enough as a starting point for Heidegger's other writings. I would recommend reading the other translations though such as the Pathways, Parmenides and Language and Thought if one is already serious about Heidegger studies as these have the important writings as well and in complete form. There are some Heideggerian writings that are especially relevant to life in Singapore and perhaps to other urban and technological cities as well and the student of philosophy may want to see how everything fits together in the works on art and technology. Tony See Philosopher in Residence (Singapore)

The best introduction to Heidegger's thought is a close reading of Being and Time itself. As many of the reviewers point out, the essays in this volume are a good collection of several of Heidegger's key essays, representing his intellectual development throughout his long life. They mark the many transitions and shifts in emphasis and thought. After writing Being and Time, Heidegger spent the rest of his life explicating and developing the many treasures one finds in the pages of that magnificent work - he went both into it, expanding ideas that were only hinted at in it, and far beyond it. For those who will not be reading Being and Time in its entirety, by having the introduction to Being and Time, this volume provides the next, though distant, best thing; for it is in these few pages that Heidegger first announces how radical and revolutionary a rupture his thought is from the history of philosophy. Just a word about the review titled 'Are you *sure* you want to do this to yourself?'. Firstly, I am not sure whether this person has actually read Heidegger in the German, but he is absolutely wrong that Heidegger is not different or no less difficult in German than he is in English - what Heidegger is doing is far more apparent in the original German. This reviewer's comments are typical Anglo-American or 'analytic' propaganda. Such comments arise out of an inability to deal with Heidegger's complex thought and an unwillingness to undergo the profound discomfort that such a thinking entails. I have indeed read the philosophers he names and, with the exception of Wittgenstein, the others, though quite important in 20th century thought, don't hold a candle to Heidegger, as Wittgenstein himself, who had thought Heidegger an incomparable philosopher, would have readily admitted. His comments are based on a long tradition, arising in the 20th century, that claimed that 'clarity' is something that is not only possible in philosophy, and language for that matter, but also desirable. Philosophy makes uncomfortable. It is meant to do so. It is the opening of new worlds and whoever has traveled can attest to the discomfort that arises from such displacement, such being out of ones home or place of dwelling. New worlds are created through language and to be forced outside `our' everyday language is to be violated. Deleuze and Lacan, both of whom he also mentions, were also incomparable philosophers who are quite difficult and who built the most profound of worlds through discomforting languages. Such journeys require a willingness to be uprooted, something which this reviewer, for whom the failure lies within these thinkers and not within himself, cannot even begin to understand.

This book is a collection of 10 + 1 essays (the + 1 being the Introduction to Heidegger's master-piece "Being and Time") by Martin Heidegger, who may very well be among the most controversial of 20th centurty philosophers. His controversy is, no doubt, due in part to his brief (10 month) affiliation with the Nazi party between 1933 and 1934; however, the majority of the controversy surrounding him probably has to do with the sheer density of his writing. Heidegger is not easy to comprehend (grasping the whole); reading him is the pursuit of apprehending (touching the surface).Heidegger does exactly what it is that philosophers are supposed to do by clearing a place in which to ask the question asked long ago by Aristotle (but forgotten - that is, covered over - by "philosophers"): the question of what it means "to be". Part of the problem with reading Heidegger is that his language is almost mystical: constant talk of revealing and concealing within the place of clearing and the ekstasis - the being outside of one's self - of humans which allows for the asking of what it means "to be". While a background in philosophy might be helpful to understand Heidegger, it may be more helpful to have a background in religion and Christian mysticism. Without knowing something of the mystical, Heidegger is bound to appear far more difficult than he actually is.It is worth noting that while Heidegger is dense, he is also a poet. His aesthetically written grace is much of what gives his contemplations about the question of being such weight and gentle force. The important thing about reading Heidegger is to do exactly what he counsels one do in observing a work of art: stand outside of yourself and into the clearing of the work of art. This is what Heidegger refers to as "ek-sistence": a combination of the words "ekstasis" and "existence". It is like a type of mystical silence that Heidegger invites the reader to: a listening *beyond* what one simply, immediately hears. This, then, is the key to reading Heidegger: not to read him (an action done first and foremost by the knowing-reading subject), but to simply let him be read - a letting him be in his being.A note on Being: it is all too easy (and all too incorrect) to interpret Heidegger's writings about Being as if he were talking about some sort of subject. Being, however, is not God or some sort of primal force or the tao or any*thing* else: no, "Being" as such does not translate from the ancient Greek and Heidegger's constant referral to Being brings the reader to the edge of her/his conceptual limits and, in so doing, creates the clearing that allows for the asking of the question. Without this clearing, there can be no philosophizing - only the history of [bad] metaphysics (the asking of what reality is), which obscures this fundamental and original question.Heidegger is well worth the time and the effort. Those that are interested in the simple questions and simple answers will be lost amid

Basic Writings is that and more. It contains lectures and the intro from Being and Time that provide a solid foundation of Heidgger's philosophy. I had the honor of being Dr Krell's student at DPU in a class in which we went through this book. Dr Krell is and avid scholar of Heidgger's work and his introductions to each of the lectures in Basic Writings are very helpful. Whether you are an experienced reader of heidegger or a novice, this collection is a great source of some of Heidegger's most important writings.