Abraham Joshua Heschel, Franz Kafka, Hannah Arendt, Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Emmanuel Levinas, Benjamin Fondane, Jewish existentialism, Lewis Gordon, Martin Buber, Emil Fackenheim, Viktor Frankl, Walter K
Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 63. Chapters: Abraham Joshua Heschel,
Franz Kafka, Hannah Arendt, Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Emmanuel
Levinas, Benjamin Fondane, Jewish existentialism, Lewis Gordon,
Martin Buber, Emil Fackenheim, Viktor Frankl, Walter Kaufmann, Hans
Jonas, Lev Shestov, Gladstone, Franz Rosenzweig, Vilém Flusser.
Excerpt: Benjamin Fondane (French pronunciation: ) or Benjamin
Fundoianu (Romanian pronunciation: ; born Benjamin Wechsler, Wexler
or Vecsler, first name also Beniamin or Barbu, usually abridged to
B.; November 14, 1898 October 2, 1944) was a Romanian and French
poet, critic and existentialist philosopher, also noted for his
work in film and theater. Known from his Romanian youth as a
Symbolist poet and columnist, he alternated Neoromantic and
Expressionist themes with echoes from Tudor Arghezi, and dedicated
several poetic cycles to the rural life of his native Moldavia.
Fondane, who was of Jewish Romanian extraction and a nephew of
Jewish intellectuals Elias and Moses Schwartzfeld, participated in
both minority secular Jewish culture and mainstream Romanian
culture. During and after World War I, he was active as a cultural
critic, avant-garde promoter and, with his brother-in-law Armand
Pascal, manager of the theatrical troupe Insula. Fondane began a
second career in 1923, when he moved to Paris. Affiliated with
Surrealism, but strongly opposed to its communist leanings, he
moved on to become a figure in Jewish existentialism and a leading
disciple of Lev Shestov. His critique of political dogma, rejection
of rationalism, expectation of historical catastrophe and belief in
the soteriological force of literature were outlined in his
celebrated essays on Charles Baudelaire and Arthur Rimbaud, as well
as in his final works of poetry. His literary and philosophical
activities helped him build close relationships with other
intellectuals: Shestov, Emil Cioran, David Gascoyne, Jacques
Maritain, Victoria Ocampo, Ilarie Voronca etc. In parallel, Fondane
also had a career in cinema: a film critic and a screenwriter for
Paramount Pictures, he later worked on Rapt with Dimitri Kirsanoff,
and directed the since-lost film Tararira in Argentina. A prisoner
of war during the fall of France, Fondane was released and spent
the occupation years in clandestinity. He was eventually captured
