Books by Jean Wahl in English
A year in brackets identifies the year of publication of an original French edition.
1925 [1920]. The Pluralist Philosophies of England and America. Translated by Fred Rothwell. London: Open Court.
This book was originally Wahl’s main doctoral thesis at the Sorbonne. It argues that “pluralism,” the view that reality is an irreducible multiplicity, legitimating a diversity of approaches, reached its apex in nineteenth-century American philosophy, especially in William James, whose thought the majority of the text is given over to explicating. It was published simultaneously with his (then obligatory) “complementary thesis” Le rôle de l’idée de l’instant dans la philosophie de Descartes, an interpretation of Descartes that evinces the strong influence of his teacher, Henri Bergson. Both of these texts have recently been re-edited and republished in French, with introductions by contemporary philosophers.
1948. The Philosopher’s Way. New York: Oxford University Press.
Written during Wahl’s exile in the United States and originally published in English, this book is driven by the conviction that the twentieth century is seeing a radical transformation in how philosophy approaches its perennial questions. In numerous brief chapters, Wahl elucidates and analyzes the Western tradition’s main theses about the basic concepts of metaphysics from the vantage that philosophy develops precisely through revolutionary changes—a conception traceable, perhaps, to Bachelard’s influential thesis about “epistemological ruptures” in scientific progress.
1949 [1949]. A Short History of Existentialism. Translated by Forrest Williams and Stanley Maron. New York: Philosophical Library.
Under sixty pages, this little book examines the thought of Kierkegaard, Jaspers/Heidegger, and Sartre and then offers a critique of existentialism. It is followed by a “discussion” of existentialism by Berdyaev, Koyré, Levinas, Marcel, and others. It was originally delivered as a lecture in Paris in 1946.
1969 [1959]. Philosophies of Existence: Introduction to the Basic Thought of Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Jaspers, Marcel, and Sartre. Translated by F. M. Lory. New York: Schocken Books.
This text is concerned, simply, with the fundamental categories common to the thought of the thinkers mentioned in the title, understood as opening a new and crucial chapter in the history of philosophy, expressing the heart of philosophy since Socrates, who “refused to separate his thought from his life” (vii). “It is hoped that a study of these categories … will lead the reader to reflect on his own existence. It is hoped, too, that he will see in these philosophies … primarily a call to his own subjectivity and perhaps the transition towards a new mode of thought that will combine sharpened subjectivity with a deep sense of communion with others and the world” (from the foreword, vii).
1974. Voices in the Dark: Fifteen Poems of the Prison and the Camp. Translated by Charles Guenther. Kirkwood, MO: The Printery.
These poems, as the title indicates, were composed while Wahl was being held by the Nazis and French collaborators at La Santé and then Drancy in 1941. It is a selection from the some one hundred poems he wrote during this time. A collector’s item, the book is a limited edition run (120 copies) on handmade paper, and signed by the translator.