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Heidegger's Temporal Idealism (Modern European Philosophy)

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In `Heidegger's Temporal Idealism', Blattner explores Heidegger's early view of temporality articulated in `Being and Time'. Blattner's central thesis is that Heidegger seeks to expound a strong view of temporal idealism, and, that he is unsuccessful in this endeavor.

This is text is geared toward readers with a good knowledge of Heidegger's early work. I read this book in conjunction with Bert Dreyfus's course on Division II of `Being and Time' (available at itunesu/UCBerkley/Phil/Phil 189). While Dreyfus reads Heidegger as a temporal realist, the two resources are a nice fit, providing the student with two informed perspectives on this interesting question.

While I am a fan of Blattner, he is an excellent young Heidegger scholar, this text book could benefit from a bit of tightening-up. In its present state, the book has an excess of structural packaging (e.g. interim summaries and such). Certainly, structure can be helpful with difficult thinkers like Heidegger, however in this case it is overdone. This choppiness may stem from the book's genesis as a series of disparate articles.

Overall, this is the best book-length discussion of Heidegger's early views on temporality of which I am aware. That said, at over $60 (paperback) it is too pricey.

This is probably the best scholarly treatment of Being and Time available. Heidegger called his unfinished magnum opus Being and Time, but readers have not had much luck making sense of his claim that he was grounding being in time. Blattner's book explains what Heidegger meant, and why he was unable to finish the book. No serious reader of Heidegger can ignore this book.