Book of the Month July , 2021 Irrational Man by William Barrett

A Professor friend of mine recommended this as a great way to my arms around Existentialism and glad that he did. The book traces the key themes of Existentialism through the writings of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger and Sartre to show the evolution and boundaries of their thinking-but before getting there does a review of western philosophical thought back through Hebraism, Hellenism and Christianity. There is a lot here,(although the book is not as long as you might think) some of it quite technical (ie way over my head!) and it references about 100 books that you will want to read after they are referenced..... but at the end of the day-the main themes "that we are defined by our actions, are responsible for those actions and that we need to at the whole, integrated person when evaluating ourselves or others" are challenging- and useful themes. Of course that is a gross over simplification of what is here and I won't pretend that I understand, much less could explain, a lot of what is here. But what I can tell you, is if you want to add something to your reading list that will challenge you to think deeply about your central beliefs about your life and how you are living it-- and further , understand more about where you current thinking likely originated, this book is very qualified for that- it covers a lot of ground and I keep coming back to different sections to re-read and re-evaluate what they mean and how they relate to my own life- and that just feels like a really good thing to revisit from time to time. Enjoy!