Although his contributions to philosophy are revered and his writings have been collected, Eric Voegelin s persona will inevitably fade with the memories of those who knew him. This book preserves the human element of Voegelin by capturing those personal recollections. Cooper and Bruhn conducted interviews with Voegelin s wife, his closest friends, and his first-generation students. Episodes of pathos, humor, fear, rivalry, and ambition are interwoven throughout the accounts. We witness Voegelin s persistent and partly self-imposed communication problems and impatience with administrative duties; his respect for prudent political actors and public servants; and his genuine affection not only for his colleagues and best students but also for diligent secretaries and empathetic nurses. Key elements of his personality repeatedly emerge: his intelligence, optimism, and integrity, combined with an acute perception of the significance of his work.
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Editorial Reviews
About the Author
Barry Cooper is Professor of Political Science at the University of Calgary and author of numerous books, including Eric Voegelin and the Foundations of Modern Political Science (University of Missouri Press). Jodi Bruhn is the co-editor and translator of The Collected Works of Eric Voegelin, Volume 13: Selected Book Reviews (University of Missouri Press). She is an editor and translator based in Ottawa, Ontario.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I have just finished reading "Voegelin Recollected--Conversations on a Life," edited by Barry Cooper and Jodi Bruhn (U. of Missouri Press,2008) 292 pp plus index, chronology and select photos.
The book consists of transcripts of interviews conducted by Cooper in the US and Bruhn in Germany. This involved extensive travel. Bruhn also translated the German language interviews. Some of the interviews must have taken place at an annual convention of the American Political Science Association, while the contributors were in attendance.
The book is organized in a surprising yet effective way. The chronology is reversed, the interviews running from Voegelin's death backwards to his early years as an academic. (Voegelin was born in 1901 and died in 1985.) The chronology is divided into four periods: Stanford, Munich, Louisiana and Vienna. There is also a chapter for Notre Dame, where he taught every third semester or so to protect his American citizenship while he was at Munich and continued the relationship for ten years after that. Not surprisingly, the Munich years are given the greater weight, because this was the time when he had the most intense interaction with graduate assistants and other students as well as his most intense interaction with the surrounding milieu (The "Hitler and the Germans" lectures). By comparison, the Vienna years are sparsely covered.
You can add Barry Cooper and Jodi Bruhn (who was then Jodi Cockerill) to the list of contributors, because their questions are often revealing commentaries based on their own knowledge of Voegelin.
I don't think Bruhn is old enough to have known Voegelin personally, but she brings an insight into human character and occasionally asks questions that deal with personal aspects of Voegelin's relationships. One example: Michael Hereth, an early student, believed many of Voegelin's students in Munich saw EV as a father-figure. In a number of instances, their own fathers had been killed in World War II.
This would tend to explain the still evident bitterness of Manfred Henningsen in his 1995 interview, although his break with Voegelin (which he describes) had taken place a quarter century earlier.
Lissy Voegelin tells us much about their life together for over fifty years. She was a wonderful wife for Eric. She accepted a life of being the "Frau Professor" and did everything for him. He didn't answer the phone or take out the trash. Later when he became relatively wealthy from stock market speculation, he tried to make it up to her for their many years of near penury. Paul Caringella helps Lissy with her recollections. It becomes evident that he had become her loving son and cared for her like no one else.
Tilo Schabert is one of the better contributors. His memory seems to be especially good. The personality of Reinhold Knoll, a true Viennese scholar and gentleman, comes across warmly in his commentary. I hadn't known that his parents were friends of EV back in the 1920's. Ellis Sandoz, a student of Voegelin from 1949 and general editor of the 34 volume Collected Works, provides a steadying voice that helps maintain perspective.
There are some funny stories, like the time when Miss Germany enrolled in EV's class. Or when the student asked EV whether Justinian preceded or followed Socrates.
I was surprised to learn that Bruno Schlesinger, distinguished head of the Christian Culture program at St. Mary's Notre Dame, had been a student of EV in Vienna in the early '30's.
There are certain thematic questions which recur through the book. One is EV's religion. To one student who could not deal with the trappings of Christianity, he said, "Christ is a true myth." This seems to have brought relief to the student, to have cut the Gordian knot. Some thought he was an agnostic. Some a sort of Lutheran. Many assumed he was Catholic and his position in Munich was likely procured for him by Bavarian Catholics who thought so.
Another theme is his demeanor towards others. He was courtly at times (One remembered him as having dance student manners "Tanzstudent"!) and he could be nasty if he thought you were a provocateur (A tale told by Walter Nicgorski, former editor of the Review of Politics). Glenn Hughes also tells a horrendous tale.
Quite unexpected are the accounts of the reasons for his decision to become an American. Apparently EV considered his flight from Vienna to be a life-altering exodus of the spirit from the land of Egypt. One way he expressed his gratitude for finding a new life in America was his apparent contentment with his living conditions. He never complained about anything when he was at LSU, according to his long time secretary, Joe Scurria (who emerges as a capable "gal Friday" and the only one who, even at the time of the interview, could read all his manuscripts). He would have preferred a better position at Yale or at Johns Hopkins (The latter position torpedoed, apparently on good evidence, by no one less than Leo Strauss).
When he returned to Munich, he returned as an American, not as a German refugee coming home. It was said he read the Herald Tribune rather than the Munich papers. He apparently did not bind himself to the society of Munich and remained aloof. As one person put it, EV would have been happiest in a boat anchored in the middle of the Atlantic. Apparently with his inaugural lecture he managed to alienate many of his Catholic supporters. As a politician, he was inept or disinterested, and in either case the result was the same: he saw his dream of a Voegelin school in Munich erode to a point where he was ready to leave. Richard Allen worked to create a position for him at the Hoover Institution and he was happy to accept it following his mandatory retirement.
Friendship is another recurring theme. Those interviewed seem to agree that he had no friends (except possibly Alfred Schütz or Gregor Sebba) in the sense of unguarded exchanges between sympathetic equals. Robert B. Heilman is interviewed and adds a few new notes to his long essay about EV. Heilman was a formidable scholar of English literature and yet was saddened by his inability to think and talk with EV at his own level. Quite different was EV's relationship with Strauss. It is brought out here, and evident in their published correspondence, that EV was open and enthusiastic and detailed while Strauss was quite the opposite. Apparently at Notre Dame EV spent a lot of time in the faculty cafeteria with Anton Herman Chroust, whom I remember as rumpled and unshaven and dirty, though certainly a genius. A picture is drawn here of the sartorially splendid EV passing the time with the grungy Tony Chroust.
In the book there is a photo of EV sitting in a lounge chair at Notre Dame. No exact location is given but I think I recognize the coffee urn in the background so I am guessing the photo was taken in the law student lounge at the law school, a few paces from the auditorium where EV lectured.
At the end of the book there is a chapter listing the 52 contributors and it gives a sentence or two about their careers and present whereabouts. Most of the interviews were conducted between 1995 and 1997. I didn't realize this until I reached the contributor list and was surprised and a little shocked to read remarks such as "He died in April 2005."
One would like to know why ten years passed before this book finally appeared. We are told there was an attempt to organize the book by topics and that didn't work. That alone would have consumed time. Perhaps the editors needed an inspiration and that proved to be the idea of the reverse chronology.
What we do know is that they conducted their interviews before it was too late.
I believe this book will become the affectionate memorial to Eric Voegelin.
Highly recommended.
The book consists of transcripts of interviews conducted by Cooper in the US and Bruhn in Germany. This involved extensive travel. Bruhn also translated the German language interviews. Some of the interviews must have taken place at an annual convention of the American Political Science Association, while the contributors were in attendance.
The book is organized in a surprising yet effective way. The chronology is reversed, the interviews running from Voegelin's death backwards to his early years as an academic. (Voegelin was born in 1901 and died in 1985.) The chronology is divided into four periods: Stanford, Munich, Louisiana and Vienna. There is also a chapter for Notre Dame, where he taught every third semester or so to protect his American citizenship while he was at Munich and continued the relationship for ten years after that. Not surprisingly, the Munich years are given the greater weight, because this was the time when he had the most intense interaction with graduate assistants and other students as well as his most intense interaction with the surrounding milieu (The "Hitler and the Germans" lectures). By comparison, the Vienna years are sparsely covered.
You can add Barry Cooper and Jodi Bruhn (who was then Jodi Cockerill) to the list of contributors, because their questions are often revealing commentaries based on their own knowledge of Voegelin.
I don't think Bruhn is old enough to have known Voegelin personally, but she brings an insight into human character and occasionally asks questions that deal with personal aspects of Voegelin's relationships. One example: Michael Hereth, an early student, believed many of Voegelin's students in Munich saw EV as a father-figure. In a number of instances, their own fathers had been killed in World War II.
This would tend to explain the still evident bitterness of Manfred Henningsen in his 1995 interview, although his break with Voegelin (which he describes) had taken place a quarter century earlier.
Lissy Voegelin tells us much about their life together for over fifty years. She was a wonderful wife for Eric. She accepted a life of being the "Frau Professor" and did everything for him. He didn't answer the phone or take out the trash. Later when he became relatively wealthy from stock market speculation, he tried to make it up to her for their many years of near penury. Paul Caringella helps Lissy with her recollections. It becomes evident that he had become her loving son and cared for her like no one else.
Tilo Schabert is one of the better contributors. His memory seems to be especially good. The personality of Reinhold Knoll, a true Viennese scholar and gentleman, comes across warmly in his commentary. I hadn't known that his parents were friends of EV back in the 1920's. Ellis Sandoz, a student of Voegelin from 1949 and general editor of the 34 volume Collected Works, provides a steadying voice that helps maintain perspective.
There are some funny stories, like the time when Miss Germany enrolled in EV's class. Or when the student asked EV whether Justinian preceded or followed Socrates.
I was surprised to learn that Bruno Schlesinger, distinguished head of the Christian Culture program at St. Mary's Notre Dame, had been a student of EV in Vienna in the early '30's.
There are certain thematic questions which recur through the book. One is EV's religion. To one student who could not deal with the trappings of Christianity, he said, "Christ is a true myth." This seems to have brought relief to the student, to have cut the Gordian knot. Some thought he was an agnostic. Some a sort of Lutheran. Many assumed he was Catholic and his position in Munich was likely procured for him by Bavarian Catholics who thought so.
Another theme is his demeanor towards others. He was courtly at times (One remembered him as having dance student manners "Tanzstudent"!) and he could be nasty if he thought you were a provocateur (A tale told by Walter Nicgorski, former editor of the Review of Politics). Glenn Hughes also tells a horrendous tale.
Quite unexpected are the accounts of the reasons for his decision to become an American. Apparently EV considered his flight from Vienna to be a life-altering exodus of the spirit from the land of Egypt. One way he expressed his gratitude for finding a new life in America was his apparent contentment with his living conditions. He never complained about anything when he was at LSU, according to his long time secretary, Joe Scurria (who emerges as a capable "gal Friday" and the only one who, even at the time of the interview, could read all his manuscripts). He would have preferred a better position at Yale or at Johns Hopkins (The latter position torpedoed, apparently on good evidence, by no one less than Leo Strauss).
When he returned to Munich, he returned as an American, not as a German refugee coming home. It was said he read the Herald Tribune rather than the Munich papers. He apparently did not bind himself to the society of Munich and remained aloof. As one person put it, EV would have been happiest in a boat anchored in the middle of the Atlantic. Apparently with his inaugural lecture he managed to alienate many of his Catholic supporters. As a politician, he was inept or disinterested, and in either case the result was the same: he saw his dream of a Voegelin school in Munich erode to a point where he was ready to leave. Richard Allen worked to create a position for him at the Hoover Institution and he was happy to accept it following his mandatory retirement.
Friendship is another recurring theme. Those interviewed seem to agree that he had no friends (except possibly Alfred Schütz or Gregor Sebba) in the sense of unguarded exchanges between sympathetic equals. Robert B. Heilman is interviewed and adds a few new notes to his long essay about EV. Heilman was a formidable scholar of English literature and yet was saddened by his inability to think and talk with EV at his own level. Quite different was EV's relationship with Strauss. It is brought out here, and evident in their published correspondence, that EV was open and enthusiastic and detailed while Strauss was quite the opposite. Apparently at Notre Dame EV spent a lot of time in the faculty cafeteria with Anton Herman Chroust, whom I remember as rumpled and unshaven and dirty, though certainly a genius. A picture is drawn here of the sartorially splendid EV passing the time with the grungy Tony Chroust.
In the book there is a photo of EV sitting in a lounge chair at Notre Dame. No exact location is given but I think I recognize the coffee urn in the background so I am guessing the photo was taken in the law student lounge at the law school, a few paces from the auditorium where EV lectured.
At the end of the book there is a chapter listing the 52 contributors and it gives a sentence or two about their careers and present whereabouts. Most of the interviews were conducted between 1995 and 1997. I didn't realize this until I reached the contributor list and was surprised and a little shocked to read remarks such as "He died in April 2005."
One would like to know why ten years passed before this book finally appeared. We are told there was an attempt to organize the book by topics and that didn't work. That alone would have consumed time. Perhaps the editors needed an inspiration and that proved to be the idea of the reverse chronology.
What we do know is that they conducted their interviews before it was too late.
I believe this book will become the affectionate memorial to Eric Voegelin.
Highly recommended.
Front Cover | Front Flap | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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Voegelin Recollected, Baton Rouge, Notre Dame, United States, Palo Alto, Eric Voegelin, Hannah Arendt, Professor Voegelin, The New Science of Politics, Max Weber, Thomas Mann, Harry Williams, Lissy Voegelin, University of Munich, Jurgen Gebhardt, Huey Long, Did Voegelin, Social Democrat, Louisiana State University, National Socialism, Paul Caringella, Hoover Institution, University of Vienna, Boston College, The History of Political Ideas Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Front Flap | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Voegelin Recollected, Baton Rouge, Notre Dame, United States, Palo Alto, Eric Voegelin, Hannah Arendt, Professor Voegelin, The New Science of Politics, Max Weber, Thomas Mann, Harry Williams, Lissy Voegelin, University of Munich, Jurgen Gebhardt, Huey Long, Did Voegelin, Social Democrat, Louisiana State University, National Socialism, Paul Caringella, Hoover Institution, University of Vienna, Boston College, The History of Political Ideas Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Front Flap | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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