Late Kant

Immanuel Kant spent many of his younger years working on what are generally considered his masterpieces: the three Critiques. But his work did not stop there: in later life he began to reconsider subjects such as anthropology, and topics including colonialism, race and peace. This text thoroughly explore Kant's later writings and give them the detailed scholarly attention they deserve. In his opening chapters, Fenves examines in detail the various essays in which Kant invents, formulates and complicates the thesis of "radical evil" - a thesis which serves as the point of departure for all his later writings. He then turns towards the counter-thesis of "radical mean-ness", which states that human beings exist on earth for the sake of another species or race of human beings. The consequences of this thesis are that human beings cannot claim possession of the earth, but must rather prepare the earth for its rightful owners.

'Fenves is one of the most innovative and brilliant thinkers now writing in the field of German philosophy and literature... [He] makes a compelling case for the importance and underserved neglect of the 'late' Kant; and suggests new ways in which Kant's work is relevant ot the present. Fenves has the rare gift of combining scrupulous historical scholarship, a finely turned literary ear, and an extraordinary analytic mind.' - Susan Shell, Boston College

Peter Fenves is Professor of German, Comparative Literature, and Jewish Studies at Northwestern University. He is the author of A Peculiar Fate: Kant and World History (1991), “Chatter”: Language and History in Kierkegaard (1993), Arresting Language: From Leibniz to Benjamin (2001), and the editor of Raising the Tone of Philosophy: Late Essays by Kant, Transformative Critique by Derrida (1993).