Society of Individuals

NORBERT ELIAS (1897-1990) was one of the greatest sociologists of the twentieth century. He studied in Breslau and Heidelberg and served as Karl Mannheim's assistant in Frankfurt. In exile after 1933, first in France and then in Britain, he wrote his magnum opus The Civilizing Process. At its ill-timed publication in 1939, it received little note. Only after his formal retirement in 1962 was the book reissued in German and translated into many other languages. That, and a flood of other books and essays, made him an international intellectual celebrity towards the end of his long life. His whole oeuvre is now appearing in new scholarly editions in the Collected Works in English. ROBERT VAN KRIEKEN is Professor of Sociology at University College Dublin.

• Norbert Elias (1897-1990); Note on the text; Preface; Part I: The Society of Individuals (1939); Part II: Problems of self-consciousness and the image of man (1940s-1950s): Wishful and fearful self-images of humans as individuals and of society; The thinking statues individualisation in the social process; Part III: Changes in the we-I balance (1987); Appendix I: Rainer Maria Rilke, 'The Book of Pilgrimage'; Appendix II: Two poems by Goethe; Appendix III: Power struggles and the concepts of 'state' and 'society'; Appendix IV: Migration and the conflict of generations; Bibliography; Index.

'The enterprise of publishing the collected works of Norbert Elias under the editorship of Richard Kilminster and Stephen Mennell by University College Dublin Press is an extremely important contribution to the contemporary intellectual and academic scene. Norbert Elias was one of the most original minds in the human and social sciences in the 20th century - his work covers not only a very broad range of sociological topics starting with his classical The Civilising Process and later The Court Society, but also many topics ranging from sociology of knowledge to sociology of sport and analysis of historical processes; the broad philosophical problems, such as the idea of the place of the progress of symbolic dimensions in social life. This is really a monumental enterprise, very worthwhile and very constructive, presenting a great challenge to the contemporary intellectual and academic scene - and UCD Press should be congratulated in undertaking this enterprise.' S. N. Eisenstadt Jerusalem, 24 July 2008 'Too easily the editors and readers of Books Ireland take it as given that Irish publishers' books are mostly about Ireland or by Irish writers. We wish it were not so because we think our publishers are of world class, and a shining exception and exemplar is this series of eighteen volumes of the life's work in English - some of his work was written in German - of Elias (1897-1990) whose major theme was the theory of civilising processes - Norbert is very interesting on the subject as well as on the dynamics of sports, social (and especially male) bonding, violence and football hooliganism. These books are in the very best tradition of design, with acid-free paper, sewn bindings, cloth boards, coloured endpapers, spine labels and acetate jackets.' Books Ireland Nov 08 'monumental series of the writings of Norbert Elias, regarded as one of the outstanding European thinkers and sociologists of the twentieth century - The books are handsomely produced in decent uniform bindings, each with an introductory essay and notes on the text.' Books Ireland October 2009