Reviews 297 from shallow criticisms and vindicates his legit- continues and responds seriously to the works of imate claims to pre-eminence at the bar of both both Arendt and Baudrillard. Naming anything, the scholarly judgement and public opinion. A and in this case, evil as it is, demands existential lengthy bibliography at the end of the book adds honesty in an atmosphere which does not want value to the book. to discuss this ancient problem of evil which the N Hariharan Russian philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev felt was Madurai unsolvable. Neiman’s book’s praxis lies in its very existence: if we neglect the study of evil, geno- Evil In Modern Thought: cides and terrorism will continue. Neiman, unlike An Alternative History of most career philosophers, discusses terrorism in Philosophy detail near the end of her book. The book under Susan Neiman review has established the urgency of studying evil if one wants to truly comprehend what the Princeton University Press, 41 Wil- liam Street, Princeton, New Jersey philosopher-turned-novelist, Iris Murdoch had 08540. usa. www.press.princeton.edu. called the ‘Sovereignty of the Good’ (See Iris Mur- 2015. xxii + 382 pp. pb. $24.95. doch, The Sovereignty of Good (London: Routledge, isbn 9780691168500. 1967)), which is the telos of all history, including Neiman’s own reading of the history of philoso- annah Arendt wrote about evil being so phy as we find here. Neiman does not write on evil banal that one does not recognise it when to exalt in it but to show how the sovereign nature Hit is encountered in its esse (See Hannah Arendt, of the good has been repeatedly apparently dis- Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of placed by the existence of evil. Evil is no privatio Evil (New York: Penguin, 1963). Arendt is central boni or simulation vide Jean Baudrillard; it is very to any study of evil today and in her Afterword in much a happening phenomenon. This reviewer this revised edition of her book originally pub- has discussed about evil in Subhasis Chattopa- lished in 2002, Neiman re-evaluates Arendt. We dhyay, ‘Prolegomenon to the Study of Evil’, Pra- will have the opportunity to speak of Arendt at buddha Bharata, 118/4 (April 2013), 278–81, 293. the end of this review. Neiman has done successfully what no other Jean Baudrillard sees evil as an intractable contemporary philosopher has the temerity to virus which has infected the cosmos: do: she has shown how the history of philosophy In a society which seeks—by prophylactic meas- demands new (mis)readings qua responses since ures, by annihilating its own natural referents, evil is inherent in the esse of the idea of the being by whitewashing violence, by exterminating all in the here and the now. Except Arendt and Bau­ germs and all of the accursed share, by perform- drillard and to some extent Giorgio Agamben, ing cosmetic surgery on the negative—to con- contemporary philosophers have been silent on cern itself solely with quantified management the problem of evil. Neiman says: and with the discourse of the Good, in a society The picture of modern philosophy as cen- where it is no longer possible to speak Evil, Evil tered in epistemology and driven by the desire to has metamorphosed into all the viral and ter- ground our representations is so tenacious that roristic forms that obsess us (Jean Baudrillard, some philosophers are prepared to bite the bul- The Transparency of Evil: Essays on Extreme Phe- let and declare the effort simply wasted. Rorty, nomena, trans. James Benedict (London: Verso, for example, finds it easier to reject modern phil- 2002), 81). osophy altogether than to reject the standard Susan Neiman’s book makes it possible once accounts of its history. His narrative is more po- again to speak of evil explicitly; and thus seek lemical than most, but it’s a polemical version of ways to annihilate it. Her act of including the the story told in most philosophy departments word ‘evil’ in the title of the book is the begin- in the second half of the twentieth century. ... ning of her cultural work as a philosopher who What began as metaphysics—the description of

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the basic structure of reality—ended as episte- Why is it that some of the best minds of this and mology: the attempt to ground the foundations the last centuries avoid the issue of Hitler? Why of our knowledge (5–6). do philosophy courses stress the abstract over the Empirical research bears out the truth of her practical lived experience of the individual in the important thesis that the larger thematic study of here and the now? Evil, that is ‘absolute wrongdo- the problem of evil took a backseat in professional ing that leaves no room for account or expiation’ discourses of philosophy during the last century (3), apparently defies all analyses. Thus, the reality and even in this century professional philosophers and the inexplicability of evil forces an otherwise shy away from discussing the problem of evil since rigorous Alvin Plantinga to lose himself in the jug- contemporary philosophy has engaged itself with glery of logic while justifying the truth of evil and a ‘timeless matters’ like ‘Goodness, truth, and beauty’ benign God. Neiman’s concern in this book is not (xvii). Yet ‘Every time we make the judgment this God per se but rather the reality and inevitability ought not to have happened, we are stepping onto of evil in all its forms and particularly, for example, a path that leads straight to the problem of evil. ... why David Hume needs to be reread to under- For it involves questions more natural, urgent, and stand evil—Neiman reads Immanuel Kant and pervasive than the skeptical epistemological quan- then through him judges Hume and how the latter daries said to drive modern philosophy’ (5). Nei- had effected the current course of philosophy and man is bold enough to attack Richard Rorty; a fact emasculated the academic domain or the study of that will ensure that she remains a prophetic and philosophy. The section ‘The Impotence of Rea- therefore a marginalised voice within mainstream son: David Hume’ in the second chapter is a tour philosophy. Martha Nussbaum, in her magnum de force in itself that should be made compulsory opus The Fragility of Goodness, for instance, keeps reading in all philosophy syllabi. This reviewer has defining what Aristotle thought about the good life scoured the internet and called up professional (See Martha C Nussbaum, The Fragility of Goodness philosophers asking them whether they have read (London: Cambridge University, 2001)). She, like Neiman’s contentions regarding Hume vis-à-vis Neiman, is a Jew; but she simply cannot face the Immanuel Kant elsewhere. None has. This chapter spectre of Hitler. Yet she is venerated globally as is sufficient reason for us to consider Neiman as the philosopher of Cosmopolitanism. How does one of the greatest philosophers alive. reviving Cosmopolitanism from the detritus of the Philosophers are notoriously bad stylists, but philosophy of the Cynics help one prevent the re- Neiman’s style is cosy and jargon-free: currence of the rise of another Hitler escapes this The question could be raised during a conver- reviewer. Nussbaum nowhere attacks Rorty or A J sational lull in a good salon: would you live Ayer—if she did so, she would not have been known your life over, if given the chance? Eighteenth- universally as a humanist. Neiman errs on the side century thinkers took a rest from more serious of being a rigorous scholar and pays for her rigour business by discussing it. Few of them were en- by remaining relatively yet undeservedly unknown. tirely clear about the form of the question. Were In this book Neiman shows us how the Hitler they seeking an empirical survey, or a normative event should have been tackled by professional claim? Were they asking whether people in gen- philosophers and what exactly needs to be done eral, and any one of us in particular, would in to prevent mass genocides of the nature com- fact repeat their lives over—or whether it would, mitted by the Nazis. Neiman studies the Lisbon on balance, be reasonable to do so? (206). earthquake and discusses Leibnitz and then cor- This is how Neiman begins writing on Ni- rectly points out the epistemic retreat enacted etzsche in the section ‘Eternal Choices: Nietzsche by contemporary thinkers—this statement too on Redemption’ in the third chapter. Anyone fa- has ensured that she remains an academic par- miliar with Nietzsche will know from the title iah. She is the only voice writing today asking the that Neiman is going to scrutinise Nietzsche in a right questions: what happened to philosophis- way he has not been evaluated before: one should ing which dealt with the hard questions of life? read this section for the scope of Neiman’s own

288 PB January 2016 Reviews 299 readings in philosophy and ancient Greek drama Reason: Rereading Kant (See Susan Neiman, The and for her power to connect philosophers as Unity of Reason: Rereading Kant (New York: Ox- disparate as Voltaire and Hegel with Nietzsche ford University, 1997)) had established her as a keeping in mind her stated aim in this book. She moral philosopher and this book secures her place never forgets to point out how all major Contin- as the only philosopher writing now worth reading, ental philosophers were writing willy-nilly on the both for the truth about the history of philosophy problem of evil. She establishes that contempor- as well as the real and not an alternative history of ary philosophers have got their priorities at least philosophy, as has been mentioned above. partially wrong: philosophy is in fact a coming Neiman contrasts Martin Heidegger with The- to terms with the reality of evil. This reviewer odor Adorno’s conception and expectations of recommends this section for another reason: death (309). Her analysis of Heidegger is perfect stylistically it is one of the most lucid and witty within the context of this book. But she misses the treatments of Nietzsche that can be found in any point that it was Heidegger’s Being and Time (1927) history of philosophy. Neiman is aware that what which triggered the retreat of philosophy into epis- she has written will not be accepted by her peers: temology and to be precise, to become the study of hence she appends to the title ‘An Alternative language and other abstractions. Heidegger’s com- Philosophy of History’. But this is the history of plicity with the Nazis is well documented. philosophy which should be taught to neophytes In this edition of the book we have Neiman and not the drab stuff which is the lot allotted as revisiting Otto Adolf Eichmann. She takes into compulsory reading to philosophy majors. account recent historical research and partly Neiman is one of the few philosophers living modifies Eichmann’s evaluation by Hannah today who can write about the reality of the Jew- Arendt. Neiman sees through Eichmann’s pose as ish cabal or ‘lobby’, and draw the ire of other Jew- a humdrum bureaucrat and through now avail- ish philosophers: able documents from Argentina where Eichmann Let me take an anti-Semitic bull by its horns and hid himself, she sees Eichmann as the true butcher address the most common suspicion. There is that he was; a man well aware of Kantian categor- indeed a Jewish lobby, more accurately known ical imperatives but bent on not applying these as aipac, which seeks to support right-wing Is- moral imperatives to his own butchery of the Jews. raeli governments who deflect responsibility for He boasted in Argentina of wanting to extermi- their own policies by emphasizing the ways in nate every Jew on earth. During his trial in Jeru- which Jews have been victims, particularly at the salem, Eichmann as it now emerges, pretended to hands of the Nazis. But it is not responsible for be just another regular person doing his job under the movement of popular consciousness from orders from his bosses. Eichmann through this Hiroshima to Auschwitz. For decades follow- tactic of being banal wanted to live on and escape ing the war, survivors of Auschwitz were viewed punishment—evil never wants to effect its own with shame and even disgust; the newly founded erasure from the world as it is. Jewish state wanted heroes, not victims (345). One last point needs to be mentioned about Neiman is frankly Jewish; she is ready to cri- Neiman’s thorough research of evil—she asks the tique her Jewish peers and this is a kind of trans- question whether the bombing of Hiroshima was parency not to be found even in Jacques Derrida, necessary? Chances are that the Americans knew Michel Foucault, or Emmanuel Lévinas. All of that destroying Hiroshima was not needed to win them were Jews reacting to their understanding the war. It takes courage to revisit the evil that of the Torah and the Fall of Jerusalem, which is happened in Japan during the Second World War repeated in the Holocaust in a Nietzschean trans- and accept that this evil was unleashed by those valuation of values and in the case of Derrida and who were purportedly good. Foucault; their own excommunications by ortho- Subhasis Chattopadhyay dox Jews. Neiman’s self-critique as a Jewish phil- Assistant Professor of English, osopher is refreshing. Her book The Unity of Ramananda College, Bishnupur

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