Description
Book SynopsisGustav Landauer was an unconventional anarchist who aspired to a return to a communal life. His antipolitical rejection of authoritarian assumptions is based on a radical linguistic scepticism that could be considered the theoretical premise of his anarchism. The present volume aims to add to the existing scholarship on Landauer by shedding new light on his work, focussing on the two interrelated notions of skepsis and antipolitics. In a time marked by a deep doubt concerning modern politics, Landauer’s alternative can help us to more seriously address the struggle for a different articulation of our communitarian and ecological needs.
Trade Review“There is no doubt about it: The anthology Skepticism and Antipolitics. The Alternative of Gustav Landauer, edited by Libera Pisano and Cedric Cohen-Skalli, is a milestone in modern reception history. Those who believed that Landauer was merely a well-read anarchist are taught better here. The seventeen studies prove that the history of Jewish philosophy in the twentieth century was significantly influenced by him.” – Prof. Dr. Thomas Meyer, lmu Munich “A century after Landauer’s murder, this groundbreaking collection of remarkably rich essays sheds new light on his revolutionary radicalism, his spiritual longing for a renewal of human communities, his linguistic skepticism inseparable from his anarchist antipolitics, and his identities as a German and as a Jew. By brilliantly putting Landauer in dialogue with Simone Weil, Margarete Susman, Leo Baeck, Martin Buber—and above all with our own troubled times—the volume is as indispensable as it is illuminating.” – Vivian Liska, Director of the Institute of Jewish Studies, Professor of German Literature, Dept. Literature and Philosophy, University of Antwerp
