Heidegger in 90 Minutes

It would be easy to look down on any book that offers to inform someone about Heidegger in "90 Minutes," yet Paul Strathern's book provides some good perspective on a philosopher hailed by some as the greatest of the twentieth century. As a former philosophy student who spent a semester on Heidegger's supposed masterpiece Being and Time (Sein und Zeit), I do not share that assessment of Heidegger. Strathern rightly raises the fundamental question whether the jargon or verbiage of Heidegger is meaningful at all (p. 33). My own personal conclusion matches that of the psychologist Jung who referred to Heidegger as the "master of complicated banalities" (p. 75). Only in a nihilistic world that has lost all faith in logical and clear thinking as a way to the truth can the absurd verbiage of Heidegger be hailed as a philosophical advance. Strathern also rightly raises the active and eager Nazism of Heidegger in the thirties that was indeed related to his philosophical ideas (p.62), although Strathern chivalrously tries to salvage the pure core of Heidegger's ideas from Nazi affinity. Finally, Strathern does not shrink back from recounting the failure of integrity and character seen in Heidegger's turning his back on his Jewish philosophical mentor Husserl during the Nazi era (p. 60) and from recounting the deception involved in Heidegger's lengthy adulterous relation with his much younger student Hannah Arendt (pp. 35-40).

As indicated by the title, this is a very quick overview of Heiddeger. As such it is interesting and well written. However, I was more interested in the philosophy than the man, and so was a bit disappointed in the relatively little attention given to Heiddeger's ideas, as opposed to his life. Some terms are not explained clearly for a beginner. An example: the author assumes that the meaning and origin of the term "phenomenology" is transparent and self-evident. The last portion of the book is very negative about the man, but does not show why this would negate the value of the philosopher's ideas. (I don't like Picasso much as an individual, but am entranced by his paintings....) In spite of my reservations, I went from almost no knowledge of Heidegger to a place where I'm ready to learn more; I'm glad I read it (and it did take just about ninety minutes to do so).