Table of Contents

Editors' Preface  vii

Acknowledgments  ix

Introduction. JankÉlÉvitch on Bergson: Living in Time / Alexandre Lefebvre  xi

Introduction  1

1. Organic Totalities  3
I. The Whole and Its Elements  4
II. The Retrospective View and the Illusion of the Future Perfect  11

2. Freedom  23
I. Actor and Spectator  24
II. Becoming  30
III. The Free Act  49

3. Soul and Body  66
I. Thought and Brain  66
II. Recollection and Perception  79
III. Intellection  89
IV. Memory and Matter  94

4. Life  109
I. Finality  109
II. Instinct and Intellect  119
III. Matter and Life  137

5. Heroism and Saintliness  151
I. Suddenness  152
II. The Open and the Closed  156
III. Bergson's Maximalism  159

6. The Nothingness of Concepts and the Plentitude of Spirit  167
I. Fabrication and Organization: The Demiurgic Prejudice  167
II. On the Possible  179

7. Simplicity . . . and Joy  191
I. On Simplicity  191
II. Bergson's Optimism  203

Appendices   211

Supplementary Pieces  247
Preface to the First Edition of Henri Bergson (1930)  247
Letters to Vladimir JankÉlÉvitch by Henri Bergson  248
Letter to Louis Beauduc on First Meeting Bergson (1923)  250
What Is the Value of Bergson's Thought? Interview with FranÇoise Reiss (1959)  251
Solemn Homage to Henri Bergson (1959)  253

Notes  261

Bibliography  299

Index  315

About the Author

Vladimir JankÉlÉvitch (1903-1985) held the chair in moral philosophy at the University of Paris-Sorbonne from 1951 to 1978, and was the author of more than twenty books on philosophy and music.

Alexandre Lefebvre is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Government and International Relations and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Sydney. He is the coeditor of Bergson, Politics, and Religion, also published by Duke University Press.

Nils F. Schott is James M. Motley Postdoctoral Fellow in the Humanities at Johns Hopkins University and the translator of several books, including The Helmholtz Curves: Tracing Lost Time, by Henning Schmidgen.

Reviews

"JankÉlÉvitch’s intransigent 'Bergsonism'– his faith in intuition and his distrust in contextualization – produced his marvelous Henri Bergson." - Giuseppe Bianco (H-France, H-Net Reviews) "JankÉlÉvitch's Henri Bergson is richly textured with reflections and digressions which sketch in embryonic form conceptual figures that would gain prominence in his later ethical writings. JankÉlÉvitch's book is thus not so much about Bergson, as it is a book through Bergson, and its two-stroke motion of understanding Bergson and of JankÉlÉvitch understanding himself is animated by a joy that gives JankÉlÉvitch's philosophical prose (finely translated by Nils F. Schott) an almost breathless quality." - Nicolas de Warren (Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews)