Revival: Bergson and His Philosophy (1920)

by John Alexander Gunn, J. Alexander Gunn

The stir caused in the civilised world by the writings of Bergson, particularly during the past decade, is evidenced by the volume of the stream of exposition and comment which has flowed and is still flowing. If the French were to be tempted to set up, after the German manner, a Bergson-Archiv they would be in no embarrassment for material, as the Appendix to this book – limited though it wisely is – will show. Mr. Gunn, undaunted by all this, makes a further, useful contribution in his unassuming but workmanlike and well-documented account of the ideas of the distinguished French thinker. It is designed to serve as an introduction to Bergson’s philosophy for those who are making their first approach to it, and as such it can be commended.

Genres: Philosophy

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1920

About the author

1896-
Sometimes published as J. Alexander Gunn

Reviews

[Kamakana · Rating 3 out of 5]

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190518: this is not exactly just a good book on bergson. this does do as the blurb says, introduce his thoughts, but i have read so much involving b that there is nothing new, nothing i have not picked up from reading on or by or referring to b, as a new reader this might be a four, the aspects i found most intriguing were that it is published in 1920, that this is a very good coverage of all his work to that date, thus no essay/chapter on his 'two sources of...', and that this is an enthusiastic assertion of thought of b...

so, nothing i have not read before in my extensive reading on b (51 books), simply a new voice, a contemporaneous voice, arguing about core b's ideas: 'duree' of time and how this changes everything about the world, time is real, time is heterogeneous, time is 'qualitative' vs space is 'quantitative', that the brain is not the mind, that memory is not material in the brain, memory is not fading impression of the past but qualitatively, or of 'kind', different from spatializing the real of experience, the real that is 'time'... this goes on some way in finding the excellent writing, the pleasure of b at which other philosophers fail, and how he could thus be dismissed as a poet rather than a philosopher...

this is not where best to start b. aside from being incomplete, such that the author imagines how b would respond to ethics and religion (before 'two sources...), i would say being of the same generation of thinkers, being thought an artist or poet (this is a bad thing in philosophy...), this work is perhaps too close- our understanding in 'time' has evolved, so i felt i already knew much of what he asserts, what b argues, what the first generation of thinkers opposed to it, and it is sort of like all the historical of early 20th C science fiction read, where it is fun trying to come upon b's thought as much those plots, and the main effect here is i am interested in what philosophy of other cultures, say indic or japanese, finds and uses b's thought...

[Ken Bour · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me a while to plow through this introduction to Bergson's philosophy. Sadly, I did not derive much insight from the effort. This version is quite dense and heavily abstract.

I have another summary of Bergson in my 'To-Read' list and, one of these days, I will see if that rendition is more useful.