Postcard from Edmund Husserl written 16.10.1932

Author Edmund Husserl

Category foreign researchers, incoming correspondence

Archive The Library of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences

Date of creation 16.10.1932

Reference code in archive Biblioteka PAU

Resource type postcard

Subject matter academic issues, organizational issues, personal issues

Field phenomenology, philosophy

Tags #academic carrier, #academic work, #Basel, #Cartesian Meditations, #Edmund Husserl, #foreign travel, #french translation, #German philosophy, #Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, #idealism, #Karl Joël, #Max Niemeyer, #meaning, #monadology, #philosophy turning point, #professorship, #recommendation, #Switzerland, #transcendentalism, #Yearbook

Freiburg, 16.X.1932

Dearest Friend,

I am deeply disappointed to hear that the appointment for the chair position has been postponed again for another year. You will pass this test, bravely as always, and it will help you grow. I wrote to Niemeyer. – I should not make you dependent on the Yearbook, which has been stalled for three years, as it awaits my new work. – I am in good shape, the month-long vacation in the Black F[orest] gave me renewed strength. Finally, I can work on the final revision (only now!). I cannot object to your Swiss plan, but I have no close connections to them. Basel would be splendid! It is only one ho[ur] from Freiburg and also near Strasbourg. It is worth a try, and as justification, you should state a lively desire for a closer connection between the German and western European philosophy, i.e. Switzerland – do not focus too much on me! However, you can use me as a personal reference. First, you should contact Prof. Joël, who is still alive and liter. active, but he is no longer in office. Maybe he will advise you; he certainly respects my work and is very benevolent. Your works will surely add value. Of yours, I will support you in any way I can. It would be wonderful!

Hopefully, you will have some time, peace, and quiet to think through the original C[artesian] Med[itations] from the beginning to the end in a way as if you knew nothing of my earlier works. You will see that the understanding you have of “idealism” of ph[enomenology], particularly after reading the Fre[nch] Med[itations] I-IV, is not yet complete. Only Med[itation] V creates the elucidation of that which is at stake there. But the whole thing only provides a glimpse of the horizon, a preview; in my opinion, enough to see that it is neither “idealism” is the hist[orical] sense, nor “transcendentalism” (Mb)*, nor Leibniz’s monadology; in short, a turn in the whole meaning of philosophy itself – and this is what one must recognize before one forms an opinion. Each interference of one’s own beliefs and any criticism during the first reading covering the meaning of this ph[ilosophy] makes it impossible to understand the meaning. Well, I have to go now!

Your friend,

E. Husserl