A Brief Eternity

'In this excellent essay Pascal Bruckner does not limit himself to exploring the multiple existential questions raised by the recent lengthening of human life or to showing how, in the course of modernity, the third age has become the philosophical age par excellence : he constantly and rightly emphasizes the ambiguities, equivocations and ambivalences of this new situation.' Le Monde 'A Brief Eternity is an ode to desire, to the passion for life, to the warm glow of human discoveries, immense or small.' L'Express Human beings have invented a new epoch in their lives: Indian summer, as Pascal Brucker calls it in his thoughtful meditation on life after 60. No longer just an anteroom to death or a fantasied Neverland of blissful retirement, it has distinct challenges and novel satisfactions that one appreciates better after reading A Brief Eternity. Written with verve and a joyful irony, it is a stimulating travelogue for that journey we all hope to make. Mark Lilla, Professor of Humanities, Columbia University Pascal Bruckner's most personal essay to date, A Brief Eternity deploys the writer's remarkable erudition and culture to respond to a very recent and important question: how to live our extended 'middle age,' our prolonged 'Indian Summer,' wisely and to the fullest. Steeped in Bruckner's usual wit, verve, and delight in paradox, A Brief Eternity is also, surprisingly, a bracing reminder of life's limitations as well as its possibilities in the Age of Covid 19. A very timely book. Richard J. Golsan, University Distinguished Professor Senior Scowcroft Fellow, the Bush School, Texas A & M University Pascal Bruckner is the philosopher of the new, always alert to the moment, always capable of identifying the unexpected turn that modern culture is taking, always two steps ahead of everyone else in describing these things, always deft, always brilliant, sometimes deep. Read any two pages, and you will see it. Paul Berman, author of Power and the Idealists and other books