Hannah Arendt: life and work

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:47

The philosopher Hannah Arendt knew firsthand what totalitarianism is. Being of Jewish origin, she passed through a Nazi concentration camp, from where she was lucky enough to escape. She subsequently made it to the United States and lived in that country until her death. Her writings on phenomenology have influenced such philosophers as Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jürgen Habermas, Giorgio Agamben, W alter Benjamin and others. At the same time, these works alienated many people from her, even close friends. Who is this woman who received such an ambiguous assessment in society? Our article will tell about the life path of Hannah Arendt, her development as a philosopher and briefly clarify the essence of her books.

Childhood

Hannah Arendt was born in 1906, October 14, in the city of Linden (German Empire). Both of her parents were from East Prussia. The engineer Paul Arendt and his wife Martha Kohn were Jewish but led a secular lifestyle. Already in childhood, spent inKönigsberg, the girl faced manifestations of anti-Semitism. In this case, she was instructed by her mother. If anti-Semitic remarks were made by the teacher, Hannah had to get up and leave the classroom. After that, the mother had the right to complain in writing. And the girl had to confront her anti-Semitic classmates herself. In principle, her childhood passed happily. The family did not even use the word "Jew", but they did not allow themselves to be treated with disrespect.

Hannah Arendt: biography

The girl from childhood showed a penchant for the humanities. She was educated at three universities - in Marburg, Freiburg and Heidelberg. Her spiritual teachers in the field of philosophy were Martin Heidegger and Karl Jaspers. The girl was not a "blue stocking" at all. In 1929 she married Gunther Anders. But this marriage fell apart after eight years. Secondly, she married Heinrich Blucher. Being shrewd, the girl immediately realized what the Nazis' coming to power promised her and her loved ones. Therefore, already in 1933, she fled to France. But Nazism overtook her there too. In 1940, she was interned in the Gurs camp. She managed to escape, and she goes to Lisbon, and from there to the United States of America. Hannah Arendt settled in New York, worked as a correspondent for The New Yorker magazine. In this capacity, she came to Jerusalem in 1961, to the trial of Adolf Eichmann.

This event was the basis for her famous book, The Banality of Evil. At the end of her life she taught at universities andcolleges in the USA. She died at the age of 69 in December 1975 in New York. About the difficult fate of Hannah Arendt in 2012, director Margaret von Trotta made a feature film of the same name.

Meaning in philosophy

In the creative heritage of Hannah Arendt there are about five hundred works of various subjects. However, they are all united by one idea - to comprehend the processes taking place in the society of the twentieth century. According to the philosopher of politics, humanity is threatened not by cataclysms of nature and not by invasion from outside. The main enemy lurks within society - it is the desire to control everyone. Hannah Arendt, whose books disappointed many Jews, did not think in terms of "peoples", "ethnic groups". She did not divide them into "guilty" and "lambs to the slaughter." In her eyes they were all human. And each person is unique. She is the founder of the theory of the origin and existence of totalitarianism.

Main works. "The Banality of Evil"

Perhaps this is the most scandalous book that Hannah Arendt has written. The Banality of Evil: Eichmann in Jerusalem came out two years after the trial of the SS-Obersturmbannführer. It was the testimony of the "architect of the Holocaust" that forced the philosopher to rethink the events that took place during the reign of the Nazis and give them a new assessment. The head of the Gestapo department spoke of his work on the "final solution of the Jewish question" as a clerical routine. He was not at all a convinced anti-Semite, tormented by a bathert, a psychopath or a flawed person. He was just following orders. And that was the main nightmare. The Holocaust is the horrific banality of evil. The philosopher does not show reverence for the victims and does not indiscriminately blaspheme the entire German people. The greatest evil is produced by the bureaucrat who meticulously performs his functions. Guilty is the system that creates these duties of mass destruction.

“About Violence”

In 1969, the philosopher continued to develop the theme of power and human freedom. Violence is just a tool with which some people and parties get what they want. So says Hannah Arendt. "On Violence" is a complex, philosophical work. The political theorist distinguishes between such concepts as government and totalitarianism. Power is connected with the need to act together, to look for allies, to negotiate. The absence of this leads to a loss of authority, consistency. The ruler, feeling the throne shaken under him, tries to hold on by violence … and he himself becomes his hostage. He can no longer loosen his grip. This is how terror is born.

The origins of totalitarianism

This book was published in 1951. It is thanks to her that Hannah Arendt is called the founder of the theory of totalitarianism. In it, the philosopher explores the various social systems that have existed throughout human history. She comes to the conclusion that totalitarianism is not like the tyrannies, despotisms and examples of authoritarianism of antiquity. It is a product of the twentieth century. Arendt calls Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia classic examples of a totalitarian society. The philosopher analyzes the socialeconomic reasons for the emergence of this system, singles out its main features and features. Basically, the book deals with examples of terror in Nazi Germany, which Hannah Arendt herself faced directly. The Origins of Totalitarianism, however, is a timeless work. We can see some features of this system in our contemporary societies of the twenty-first century.