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outcolder's review against another edition
3.0
"Human" is too universal a term for what Arendt is doing here, starting with Greeks and Romans and then working through the big changes in European thought that add up to Modernism. There were some moments in the final chapter that were intriguing but all that Plato, Aristotle and the rest of 'em just felt like a misguided attempt at the "master's tools." I had brief flashes of, gee, maybe I should learn these ancient philosophy words, but if anything this book made me want to get even further away from all these cats she references and explore non-Western philosophy and feminist philosophy. I mean, all the stuff she has in here about "animal laborans" and absolutely nothing about the personal being political even in Ancient Rome or wherever was a big disappointment. You'd almost think she was agreeing with Aristotle and others on the merits of slavery and hierarchy. Glad to be done with it.
lizawall's review against another edition
I have to tell you the truth: I just can never finish this book. I'm a little disappointed in myself. There is something kind of comforting though about always having more, because when you are done with The Human Condition, what is left?
aethenea's review against another edition
I finished approximately 75 % of the book for one of my university courses and I don't really plan to finish it.
xavierbonilla's review against another edition
4.0
This is a great work of Arendt because it details much of her philosophy. Namely, the vita activa and vita contemplativa. It also details the differences between work, labor, and action. Yet, the book feels a bit lost in some parts. It’s a staple of her philosophy but not her best work.
books_ergo_sum's review against another edition
informative
reflective
slow-paced
3.0
Hannah Arendt, reading us for filth.
Underneath all the philosophy blah blah in here, this was just Hannah Arendt spilling some piping hot tea 💅
Because when you get to the end of this book and she says:
”the modern age—which began with such an unprecedented and promising outburst of human activity—may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.”
She’s not wrong. And she has the densest 300+ pages on the history of ideas from antiquity to the 20th century to prove it.
It was interesting to think how much she was going against the grain in 1958 to argue that our work culture and technological advances undermine human agency and political freedom (the first pages of Bowling Alone, for example, cite a few 1958 articles showing how optimistic people were about politics and civic engagement at the time) but nowadays we just read this like… 😅😅 yeahhh.
On the one hand, the method in here was cool. She looked at Western history, isolated a few different modes of human activity (like politics or labour) and explained how different historical periods prioritized some modes over others, surprisingly randomly. And how, at least according to most of human history, the mode of activity our culture is currently prioritizing (labour) is the worst one.
Very cool. Very well researched.
But—almost unreadable. Unfortunately for us, German philosophy had a ‘no thesis statements’ trend for a while there. I think it was supposed to be about philosophical integrity? Like, let the details speak for themselves; don’t make sensationalist arguments like those dirty stinky French philosophers…
But honestly, it was just annoying. If I have to read your philosophy book twice in order to suss out its unstated arguments, let’s call a spade a spade and say its format sucks.
Underneath all the philosophy blah blah in here, this was just Hannah Arendt spilling some piping hot tea 💅
Because when you get to the end of this book and she says:
”the modern age—which began with such an unprecedented and promising outburst of human activity—may end in the deadliest, most sterile passivity history has ever known.”
She’s not wrong. And she has the densest 300+ pages on the history of ideas from antiquity to the 20th century to prove it.
It was interesting to think how much she was going against the grain in 1958 to argue that our work culture and technological advances undermine human agency and political freedom (the first pages of Bowling Alone, for example, cite a few 1958 articles showing how optimistic people were about politics and civic engagement at the time) but nowadays we just read this like… 😅😅 yeahhh.
On the one hand, the method in here was cool. She looked at Western history, isolated a few different modes of human activity (like politics or labour) and explained how different historical periods prioritized some modes over others, surprisingly randomly. And how, at least according to most of human history, the mode of activity our culture is currently prioritizing (labour) is the worst one.
Very cool. Very well researched.
But—almost unreadable. Unfortunately for us, German philosophy had a ‘no thesis statements’ trend for a while there. I think it was supposed to be about philosophical integrity? Like, let the details speak for themselves; don’t make sensationalist arguments like those dirty stinky French philosophers…
But honestly, it was just annoying. If I have to read your philosophy book twice in order to suss out its unstated arguments, let’s call a spade a spade and say its format sucks.