The Decline of the WestOxford University Press, 1991 - 414 Seiten Since its first publication in two volumes between 1918-1923, The Decline of the West has ranked as one of the most widely read and most talked about books of our time. In all its various editions, it has sold nearly 100,000 copies. A twentieth-century Cassandra, Oswald Spengler thoroughly probed the origin and "fate" of our civilization, and the result can be (and has been) read as a prophesy of the Nazi regime. His challenging views have led to harsh criticism over the years, but the knowledge and eloquence that went into his sweeping study of Western culture have kept The Decline of the West alive. As the face of Germany and Europe as a whole continues to change each day, The Decline of the West cannot be ignored. The abridgment, prepared by the German scholar Helmut Werner, with the blessing of the Spengler estate, consists of selections from the original (translated into English by Charles Francis Atkinson) linked by explanatory passages which have been put into English by Arthur Helps. H. Stuart Hughes has written a new introduction for this edition. In this engrossing and highly controversial philosophy of history, Spengler describes how we have entered into a centuries-long "world-historical" phase comparable to late antiquity. Guided by the philosophies of Goethe and Nietzsche, he rejects linear progression, and instead presents a world view based on the cyclical rise and decline of civilizations. He argues that a culture blossoms from the soil of a definable landscape and dies when it has exhausted all of its possibilities. Despite Spengler's reputation today as an extreme pessimist, The Decline of the West remains essential reading for anyone interested in the history of civilization. |
Inhalt
INTRODUCTION | 3 |
THE MEANING OF NUMBERS | 41 |
THE PROBLEM OF WORLDHISTORY | 70 |
THE SYMBOLISM | 87 |
APOLLINIAN | 97 |
Architecture and divinities 97 The Egyptian and the Chinese | 110 |
Varieties of human portraiture 135 Hellenistic portraiture | 149 |
the end | 155 |
PROBLEMS OF THE ARABIAN | 268 |
PROBLEMS OF THE ARABIAN | 299 |
PROBLEMS OF THE ARABIAN | 319 |
THE PROBLEM | 354 |
STATE AND HISTORY | 360 |
PHILOSOPHY OF POLITICS | 382 |
THE FORMWORLD OF ECONOMIC | 398 |
THE FORMWORLD OF ECONOMIC | 409 |
Andere Ausgaben - Alle anzeigen
The Decline of the West, Band 1 Oswald Spengler,Charles Francis Atkinson Keine Leseprobe verfügbar - 1992 |
Häufige Begriffe und Wortgruppen
actuality alien Apollinian Arabian architecture Aristotle Avesta Baroque become body Caesar causality century Chinese Christianity Church cities Civilization Classical colour conception consciousness creation cults Culture deep depth Destiny dominates dynamic economic Egyptian element epoch ethical Euclidean Euclidean geometry existence expression fact Faustian Faustian soul feeling force form-language form-world German Goethe Gothic Greek human idea individual infinite inner intellectual Islam Jesus Joachim of Floris Judaism language Leibniz living Magian Mandaean Marcion mathematic matter means ment merely metaphysical Mithras Monophysite Nature Nestorian never notion numina organic painting period Persian philosophy physics picture Plato political possesses possible prime symbol primitive Pseudomorphosis pure race relation religion religious Rembrandt Renaissance Roman Rome Russian secret sense significance space Spengler spirit Stoicism style symbol theory things thought tion truths ture understanding waking-consciousness West Western whole word world-feeling world-history