Mezi minulostí a budoucností

The essays in which Hannah Arendt questions the nature of freedom, authority and history are linked by the motif of a fateful break: the interruption of the Western philosophical tradition resulted in the totalitarianism of the twentieth century. The book, first published in 1961, is therefore introduced by a statement by René Char, a French poet and member of the Resistance during the Nazi occupation of France: 'Our heritage has been bequeathed to us by no testament'. The quotation, which echoes through the eight essays, points to the difficult position of modern man: a gulf has opened up between the past and the future, and inherited concepts cannot be used to bridge it.

Czech edition