Hannah Arendt (1905-75) was a German-born American philosopher and political theorist. Gershom Scholem (1897-1982) was a German-born Israeli philosopher and historian. Marie Louise Knott is a journalist, translator, and writer, and the author of two books on Arendt, including Unlearning with Hannah Arendt. Anthony David is the author of The Patron: A Life of Salman Schocken and the editor and translator of volumes of Scholem's diaries and letters.
Now that the full correspondence of Hannah Arendt and Gershom Scholem has finally been published, we can begin to understand the contours and dynamics of a relationship that was always complex. These letters illuminate the historical record by placing into context and documenting not only the profound differences between these powerful personalities but also their commonalities, shared activities, interests, and loyalties. -- Steven E. Aschheim, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, on the German edition Inevitably, being Jewish was the central fact of their lives, and they devoted much of their careers to wrestling with the historical and political meaning of Jewishness. . The cover of The Correspondence of Hannah Arendt and Gershom Scholem, newly published in English (edited by Marie Luise Knott and translated from German by Anthony David), underscores these similarities with a visual rhyme. Arendt and Scholem are each portrayed, in separate photographs, in the act of consulting a giant tome against a background of crowded bookshelves--emblems of lives spent reading, writing, and thinking. Yet as these letters show, it was the very things that Arendt and Scholem had in common that turned out to be responsible for the ultimate rupture of their friendship. -- Tablet