Kant

ALEXANDRE KOJÈVE (1902-1968) was one of the major philosophers of the twentieth century. His famous lectures on Hegel and his provocative end-of-history thesis left an indelible mark on contemporary thought. By the end of the Second World War, he abandoned academic philosophy to embark on a diplomatic career. While occupying an influential position in French foreign trade diplomacy, Kojève worked on a series of manuscripts which largely remained unpublished until well after his death. Initially dismissed as post-historical irony and play, Kojève's post-war philosophical writings should open new perspectives on how we became post-historical and where we go from here.

In Kojève Kant finally found the reader prepared to philosophise with rather than about him. Beginning where Kant ends, in the Doctrine of Method, Kojève addresses fundamental questions to the critical philosophy situating it as the final gesture of a philosophy of transcendence before its transformation into the Hegelian system of knowledge. Hager Weslati's lucid translation finally makes Kojève's Kant available in English, providing a key text to understanding the full span and ambition of Kojève's history of philosophy as well as access to a unique episode in the French reception of Kant's critical philosophy.