Social Renewal or Intellectual Utopia? Hannah Arendt and Die Wandlung

Abstract

The paper presents an analysis of Arendt’s essays published in the journal “Die Wandlung” and some of her later works dealing with the topic of intellectual renewal from the background of the crisis of thinking. The core thesis is that Arendt develops the Jaspersian idea of intellectual renewal on a practical level, aiming to overcome cultural boundaries and national prejudices while building a new commonality despite the social atomization after the break with previous traditions. To prove this, I examine Arendt’s concept of renewal from the standpoint of its connection with three temporal perspectives – the one of the German national-socialist past, symbolizing the destruction of traditions, the one of the fragile post-war present, oscillating between destructive nihilism and soothing self-deception, and the one of the future where philosophy plays not a leading but still a largely significant role.