"Düttman is in fact the only young 'German' philosopher who has published books that are interesting, challenging, and innovative beyond the German frontiers and that are perfectly able to compete with some of the most celebrated works on the international scene."—Werner Hamacher
"Original and masterful . . . Any serious student of postmodern thought in its literary, philosophical, or theological aspects should want to read this work."—Alan Udoff
Description
In this book Alexander García Düttman explores and expands the works of Heidegger, Rosenzweig, Adorno, Benjamin, and Derrida. Out of his very fresh and pointed re-reading, he uncovers a peculiar correspondence of obsessions, interests, and priorities between these diverse twentieth century philosophies, And from these discoveries Düttman details a singular philosophical theory of memory and promise.
Düttman’s methodology is as groundbreaking as his discoveries, Alan Udoff writes: “This is not an exposition in the conventional sense: a scholarly, historical report, with some attempt at criticism, Rather, it is at every turn a thinking through of certain texts, a thinking that, in putting questions to the texts . . . reveals or releases what is . . . stored in those texts.” Düttman’s questions are so philosophically and theologically penetrating that the reader is set out in new direction of thinking.
While Düttman’s book helps the reader achieve a new understanding of the gift of language in the works of Adorno, Benjamin, Heidegger, and Rosenzweig, his study also is fraught with implications for reading Derrida, Deleuze, Levinas and Lyotard.
About the Author
Alexander García Düttman is professor of German at Middlesex University, England,
November 2000
