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Heidegger's Later Writings: A Reader's Guide

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It is surprising that this book has not attracted more attention. As an introduction to Heidegger's notoriously difficult later texts there is nothing else like it. Braver bases his essays on Krell's Basic Writings making this the perfect companion text to a course on the later Heidegger. Braver's style is clear, precise and sympathetic to the struggles that the reader will most certainly be having with Heidegger's difficult style. He manages to pull off the difficult task of pushing the reader toward Heidegger's texts rather than away (as many such introductions do by outlining the difficulties over the benefits). Rather than replacing the direct reading of Heidegger it acts as a spur to delve into the essays themselves. There is no mystification of Heidegger here and for that we can be thankful.

Although the work is clearly aimed at students (and by extension teachers) Braver does not reduce Heidegger down to the bare bones. In fact nothing important is excluded here or at least nothing a non-specialist requires for gaining a foothold. The important ideas are explained but in such a manner that nothing is explained away. This might give the impression that there is nothing to be gained here for specialists, but that is incorrect. I found myself discovering all kinds of details hidden in Braver's notes and in some cases Braver's conclusions have forced me to re-consider my own assumptions about what these essays mean. There are three kinds of people who should own this book (1) students both undergraduate and graduate trying to make sense of the later Heidegger (2) teachers who should certainly consider it a potential classroom text to accompany a course on the later Heidegger alongside Krell's Basic Writings (3) Heidegger scholars who tend to ignore the later essays as mytho-poetic or downright weird. I, for one, have had to re-evaluate my own position of the later writings based on this book and therefore I cannot recommend it enough.

This book is designed to be a handy companion to Heidegger's BASIC WRITINGS (edited by Krell) which has been used in philosophy classrooms for over thirty years now. Professor Braver give us readers concise and lucid summaries of each essay's themes and arguments and, when needed, just the right amount of historical context (Heidegger vs Aristotle, Heidegger vs Kant). I just wish I had had this reader's guide twenty-five years ago when I was a bewildered undergraduate philosophy major.

Lee Braver belongs among a number of analytically oriented interpreters of Heidegger. In his book A Thing of This World: A History of Continental Anti-Realism (Topics in Historical Philosophy) for example he attempts to interpret the history of Continental philosophy in terms of a schema of realism and anti-realism that he develops from analytic philosophy. Attempting to interpret Continental philosophy from the standpoint of analytic philosophy has some potential dangers and drawbacks but the virtues of Braver's analyses, both in A Thing of this World, and in this book far outweigh any potential problems.

The main virtue that Braver brings to bear in his Heidegger interpretations is clarity. Everyone complains about Heidegger's writing especially when they are trying to read him for the first time. Heidegger makes no effort to meet the reader half-way. I have been reading Heidegger for five years or so and I still get extremely frustrated with Heidegger's language at times. Unfortunately many of the secondaries on Heidegger are just as opaque as Heidegger himself. Braver stands out for his clarity, a virtue he probably inherited from his studies in analytic philosophy. Braver brings the clarity of analytic philosophy to bear on Heidegger.

Braver is also able to remove much of the aura of mysticism surrounding Heidegger's later philosophy. When Heidegger talks about destinings of Being, for example, the tendency is to treat this as very profound, mysterious, and mystical. In reality there is nothing terribly mystical about it. Braver explains that for Heidegger our encounter with beings is always based on the as-structure. We never encounter a pure object with no meaning or significance; we always encounter beings as meaningful. The way in which we predominantly encounter beings is not, however, under our control since any action on our part implies that we already stand within the clearing of Being and within a certain understanding of Being. This is a part of our throwness. Braver is, therefore, not only able to remove the aura of mysticism from Heidegger's discussions of destinings of Being; he also provides arguments that support Heidegger's position, which is something Heidegger rarely does, thereby making Heidegger's views seem plausible. And that is perhaps the main virtue of this book.

Heidegger's views often seem implausible and strange particularly on a first reading. Heidegger does not seem to make much of an effort to persuade in his own essays; he simply pronounces like a prophet. I think this is part of the reason that many people, including myself, get frustrated reading Heidegger. Human beings do not like prophets; a fact attested to by human history. Prophets are rarely treated with anything but scorn, at least in their own time. I think the knee-jerk reaction that many people feel when reading Heidegger ultimately has less to do with his difficulty (all philosophy is difficult) and more to do with the perhaps unconscious feeling that Heidegger is engaging in prophecy and attempting to be more than human (I am not sure that Heidegger is entirely innocent in that respect). When we feel someone is trying to be a prophet, or more than human, our tendency is to want to bring them down to size and I have a feeling that this is what underlies a great deal of the animosity directed at Heidegger. Braver completely removes the aura of prophecy from Heidegger's positions by presenting arguments for them; and because we do not feel we are being preached at we are in a position to assess those arguments without being driven by our knee-jerk reactions. All of this has the effect of making Heidegger's views more philosophically plausible which should be the goal of any good expository book on a philosopher (of course critiques which make views seem less plausible also have their place).

For all of these reasons I highly recommend Braver's book as a companion to Heidegger's later essays.