I am sad to see no other reviews of this book on Amazon. This is a well written book full of essays written by Albert Camus for the french resistance paper Combat. Like the title suggests Albert Camus is faced 'Between Hell And Reason' with what he and the world was faced against. Much like Orwell's "Homage To Catalonia" we see the writer in his early age before his written his major works and going off into the abyss of war. We see them mold ideas which mostly are more radical and less complicated which they would use later to write "masterpieces".

The essays start with the liberation of Paris. The topics throughout the book go from self critique of the paper to responses of major figures in the war. My favorite essays were the ones that pointed out how false and fake the press were during the war. Camus however doesn't just criticize other figures and press, he self-critques his own paper Combat. Camus is very honest and isn't just filled with meaningless words. He really means what he says and doesn't say it if it's not true. Mostly when I read political essays and other works of the same nature, I mostly feel alienated and disagree but with "Between Hell And Reason" I could understand and really believe what Camus said. Very few political pieces do that to me.

This edition of "Between Hell And Reason" has a big introduction with translator's notes and footnotes for the essays. Anyone who wants to really study Albert Camus could use a lot from this edition of "Between Hell And Reason."

This book has become something of a classic. It unearths a mass of detail about Arendt's life - the pages on her upbringing and experiences before her flight from Europe are particularly memorable. However, the main focus is kept firmly on the way Arendt's thought developed during her life. The author [who knew Arendt in her later years] is well versed in philosophy and political thought and so her account becomes a useful companion to studies of Arendt's many contributions to modern thought: 'totalitarianism', 'the banality of evil', the loss of public space in the contemporary west and much more. This book is not the kind of simple minded attempt to reduce thought to biography that we see all too often. While it is no hagiography [Arendt comes in for some serious criticism on occasion], it ends with a sense of celebration for a life well lived, one of passionate thinking motivated by 'love of the world'

I must say that this book comes a VERY close second to the Peter Gay series in terms of content and style. David Stafford-Clark has spent years studying Freud, and it truly shows in this amazing masterpiece. Staying away from a purely biographical text, Stafford-Clark is able to pull information from Freud's books, letters, studies, and stories to weave together a highly informative piece that anyone could take something away from. I highly recommend it to anyone who has ever had any interest in Freud, and especially to those who have always criticized him without ever reading him.