Henri Bergson by Vladimir Jankélévitch
Praise & Reviews
"Jankélévitch’s intransigent 'Bergsonism'– his faith in intuition and his distrust in contextualization – produced his marvelous Henri Bergson." — Giuseppe Bianco, H-France, H-Net Reviews
"Jankélévitch's Henri Bergson is richly textured with reflections and digressions which sketch in embryonic form conceptual figures that would gain prominence in his later ethical writings. Jankélévitch's book is thus not so much about Bergson, as it is a book through Bergson, and its two-stroke motion of understanding Bergson and of Jankélévitch understanding himself is animated by a joy that gives Jankélévitch's philosophical prose (finely translated by Nils F. Schott) an almost breathless quality." — Nicolas de Warren, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews
"Vladimir Jankélévitch's reading of Henri Bergson remains fresh and vital, it is written with tremendous erudition and diligence, and it provides a 'Bergson regained' for a whole new generation of readers of a truly great philosopher. Jankélévitch gives us Bergson as a philosopher of life and also a figure for whom philosophy should be a way of life." — Keith Ansell-Pearson, Warwick University
"There is no question that Vladimir Jankélévitch’s Henri Bergson is one of the most important books written on Bergson. Equally, there is no question that Deleuze’s book on Bergson is one of most important. However, what distinguishes the two, and what makes Jankélévitch’s book really valuable are the three chapters he added in 1959. These three chapters tell us precisely how to understand Bergson’s ethics (especially the chapter on Bergson and Judaism), and they contain the seeds of Jankélévitch’s own later work. Having such an accurate and scholarly English translation is great. The Introduction, by Alexandre Lefebvre, who is one of our most important Anglophone commentators on Bergson, is illuminating." — Leonard Lawlor, Penn State University