For 15 years, Henri Bergson, the most important French philosopher of the early 20th-century, taught at the Collège de France. Speaking without notes, most of his classes are now lost to history, but records of a handful of courses fortuitously survived thanks to stenographic transcripts. Conveying Bergson’s very voice, these extraordinary documents are finally presented here in English. The 1904–1905 lectures are dedicated to the topic of freedom, or as Bergson put it, “the evolution of the problem of freedom.� Building on the philosophy of freedom from his first book, Time and Free Will, he proposes that freedom is not only a fundamental human experience but characteristic of all life as such. By retracing how ancient and modern philosophers have dealt with the delicate question of freedom, Bergson demonstrates the necessity, and also the radically new character, of his own theory of freedom. Bergson’s lectures are a feast for many audiences. For philosophers, they give a fuller picture of his thought and contain deep reflections on many core topics in philosophy today, from the nature of time to the difference between brain and mind, the relation between memory and perception, and the vindication of freedom over determinism. For intellectual historians, the lectures are a treasure trove: as a slice of the living thought of a great thinker; as an extended analysis of the natural and human sciences of his day; and as a rich commentary on the history of ancient and modern philosophy. Finally, for cultural historians and literary scholars, the lectures were the cultural capital of Belle Époque France, consumed by elites and a vast educated public. They are also part of an exceedingly rare genre in modern philosophy: spoken, not written, lectures and expressed as a veritable stream of philosophical consciousness that is remarkably structured and analytically lucid.

The Dictionary of Dreams provides the necessary tools to interpret almost every dream object and its hidden meaning to better understand what your subconscious is telling you. Now in a pocket-size edition for easy, on-the-go instruction. Dreams can be fun and adventurous, but also frightening and distorted, and still again, they can be an endless combination of both. From spitting teeth out (a sign of aging), to creepy, crawly spiders (a sign that one feels like an outsider), dreams can mean much more to us once we learn how to decipher their hidden meanings. Whether positive or negative, The Dictionary of Dreams gives you all the tools, symbols, and their true meanings to translate our cryptic nightly images. Starting with selections from classic texts like Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, and 10,000 Dreams Interpreted by Gustavus Hindman Miller, one of the first authors to complete a thorough study of all the symbols that appear in our dreamscape, this updated edition features revisions (such as the addition of cell phones, computers, televisions, and more) of Miller's original interpretations to bring the book up to speed with our modern life.

A major new translation of one of the an important philosophical work of the twentieth century, presenting Bergson's masterwork to a new generation of readers This new translation improves enormously on the quality of the previous translation, the only one available since 1911 Includes a host of additional new features, many translated for the first time including a comprehensive table of contents; a translation glossary; letters and reviews by William James, Georges Canguilhelm and Gilles Deleuze; full scholarly notes to each chapter Responses by Bergson to many of these, and many of which have been translated for the first time. Translated by Donald Landes, whose translation of Phenomenology of Perception (Routledge 2011, 2013) has already achieved classic status.

"Since the end of the last century," Walter Benjamin wrote, "philosophy has made a series of attempts to lay hold of the 'true' experience as opposed to the kind that manifests itself in the standardized, denatured life of the civilized masses. It is customary to classify these efforts under the heading of a philosophy of life. Towering above this literature is Henri Bergson's early monumental work, Matter and Memory."Along with Husserl's Ideas and Heidegger's Being and Time, Bergson's work represents one of the great twentieth-century investigations into perception and memory, movement and time, matter and mind. Arguably Bergson's most significant book, Matter and Memory is essential to an understanding of his philosophy and its legacy.This new edition includes an annotated bibliography prepared by Bruno Paradis.

The Dictionary of Dreams provides the necessary tools to interpret almost every dream object and its hidden meaning to better understand what your subconscious is telling you. Dreams can be fun and adventurous, but also frightening and distorted, and still again, they can be an endless combination of both. From spitting teeth out (a sign of aging), to creepy, crawly spiders (a sign that one feels like an outsider), dreams can mean much more to us once we learn how to decipher their hidden meanings. Whether positive or negative, The Dictionary of Dreams gives you all the tools, symbols, and their true meanings to translate our cryptic nightly images. Starting with selections from classic texts like Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, and 10,000 Dreams Interpreted by Gustavus Hindman Miller, one of the first authors to complete a thorough study of all the symbols that appear in our dream-scape, this updated edition features revisions (such as the addition of cell phones, computers, televisions, and more) of Miller's original interpretations to bring the book up to speed with our modern life. Elegantly designed and beautifully illustrated, the Complete Illustrated Encyclopedia series offers comprehensive, display-worthy references on a range of intriguing topics, including birthday astrology, techniques for harnessing the power of dreams, flower meanings, and the stories behind signs and symbols.

"With its signal distinction between 'intuition' and 'analysis' and its exploration of the different levels of Duration (Bergson's term for Heraclitean flux), An Introduction to Metaphysics has had a significant impact on subsequent twentieth century thought. The arts, from post-impressionist painting to the stream of consciousness novel, and philosophies as diverse as pragmatism, process philosophy, and existentialism bear its imprint. Consigned for a while to the margins of philosophy, Bergson's thought is making its way back to the mainstream. The reissue of this important work comes at an opportune time, and will be welcomed by teachers and scholars alike." --Peter A. Y. Gunter, University of North Texas

Bloechl (philosophy, Catholic U. of Leuven, Belgium) provides an introduction to this collection of 12 essays, all of which are published here for the first time in English (some have appeared previously in other languages or have been delivered as lectures). Arrangement is in sections on relations with others, and the question of God. A sampling of topics: the alterity of the stranger and the experience of the alien (Robert Bernasconi), Levinas from phenomenology to the immemorial (Michael Newman), and Levinas's God and Freud's trauma (Rudi Visker). The volume is not indexed.

A monumental work by an important philosopher, "Matter and Memory" represents one of the great inquiries into perception and memory, movement and time, matter and mind. Henri Bergson surveys these independent but related spheres, exploring the connection of mind and body to individual freedom of choice. Essential to an understanding of Bergson's philosophy and its legacy, this volume appears on the Malaspina Great Books Core Reading List.

MATTER AN D MEMORY HENRI BERGSON MEMBIR OF THE INSTITUTE PKOFE8SOR AT THE COLLEGE DE I-RANGE Authorized Translation by NANCY MARGARET PAUL AND W. SCOTT PALMER LONDON GEORGE ALLEN UNWIN LTD. RUSKIN HOUSE, MUSEUM STREET, W, C. NEW YORK i THE MACMILLAN CO. FIRST PUBLISHED January 191 1 REPRINTED January 1912, March 1913 September 1919 TRANSLATORS NOTE THIS translation of Monsieur Bergsons Matibre et MSmoire has been made from the fifth edition of 1908, and has had the great advantage of being revised in proof by the author. Monsieur Bergson has also written a new Introduction for it, which supersedes that which accompanied the original work. The translators offer their sincere thanks to the author for his invaluable help in these matters and for many suggestions made by him while the book was in manuscript. They beg leave to call the readers attention to the fact that all the marginal notes are peculiar to the English edition and that, although Mon sieur Bergson has been good enough to revise them, he is not responsible for their insertion or character, since they form no part of his own plan for the book N. M. P. W. S. P. INTRODUCTION THIS book affirms the reality of spirit and the reality of matter, and tries to determine the rela tion of the one to the other by the study of a defi nite example, that of memory. It is, then, frankly dualistic. But, on the other hand, it deals with body and mind in such a way as, we hope, to lessen greatly, if not to overcome, the theoretical difficulties which have always beset dualism, and which cause it, though suggested by the immediate verdict of consciousness and adopted by common sense, to be held in small honour among philoso phers. Thesedifficulties are due, for the most part, to the conception, now realistic, now idealistic, which philosophers have of matter. The aim of our first chapter is to show that realism and idealism both go too far, that it is a mistake to reduce matter to the perception which we have of it, a mistake also to make of it a thing able to produce in us perceptions, but in itself of another nature than they. Matter, in our view, is an aggregate of images And by image we mean a certain existence which is more than that which the idealist calls a representation, but less than that which the realist calls a thing, an vii VU1 INTRODUCTION existence placed half-way between the thing and the representation This conception of matter is simply that of common sense. It would greatly astonish a man unaware of the specula tions of philosophy if we told him that the object before him, which he sees and touches, exists only in his mind and for his mind, or even, more gener ally, exists only for mind, as Berkeley held. Such a man would always maintain that the object exists independently of the consciousness which perceives it. But, on the other hand, we should astonish him quite as much by telling him that the object is entirely different from that which is perceived in it, that it has neither the colour as cribed to it by the eye, nor the resistance found in it by the hand. The colour, the resistance, are, for him, in the object they are not states of our mind they are part and parcel of an existence really independent of our own. For common sense, then, the object exists in itself, and, on the other hand, the object is, in itself, pictorial, as we perceive it image it is, but a self-existing image. This isjust the sense in which we use the word image in our first chapter. We place ourselves at the point of view of a mind unaware of the dis putes between philosophers, Such a mind would naturally believe that matter exists just as it is perceived and, since it is perceived as an image the mind would make of it, in itself, an image. In a word, we consider matter before tibe dissocia tion which idealism and realism have brought INTRODUCTION Ix about between its existence and its appearance...

The Nobel Laureate discusses not only how and why he became a philosopher but also his conception of philosophy as a field distinct from science and literature. A source of inspiration for physicists as well as philosophers, Bergson's essays declare the emphasis of intuition over intellect.

For 15 years, Henri Bergson, the most important French philosopher of the early 20th-century, taught at the Collège de France. Speaking without notes, most of his classes are now lost to history, but records of a handful of courses fortuitously survived thanks to stenographic transcripts. Conveying Bergson’s very voice, these extraordinary documents are finally presented here in English. The 1904–1905 lectures are dedicated to the topic of freedom, or as Bergson put it, “the evolution of the problem of freedom.� Building on the philosophy of freedom from his first book, Time and Free Will, he proposes that freedom is not only a fundamental human experience but characteristic of all life as such. By retracing how ancient and modern philosophers have dealt with the delicate question of freedom, Bergson demonstrates the necessity, and also the radically new character, of his own theory of freedom. Bergson’s lectures are a feast for many audiences. For philosophers, they give a fuller picture of his thought and contain deep reflections on many core topics in philosophy today, from the nature of time to the difference between brain and mind, the relation between memory and perception, and the vindication of freedom over determinism. For intellectual historians, the lectures are a treasure trove: as a slice of the living thought of a great thinker; as an extended analysis of the natural and human sciences of his day; and as a rich commentary on the history of ancient and modern philosophy. Finally, for cultural historians and literary scholars, the lectures were the cultural capital of Belle Époque France, consumed by elites and a vast educated public. They are also part of an exceedingly rare genre in modern philosophy: spoken, not written, lectures and expressed as a veritable stream of philosophical consciousness that is remarkably structured and analytically lucid.

The twentieth century - with its unprecedented advances in technology and scientific understanding - saw the birth of a distinctively new and 'modern' age. Henri Bergson stood as one of the most important philosophical voices of that tumultuous time. An intellectual celebrity in his own life time, his work was widely discussed by such thinkers as William James, Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell, as well as having a profound influence on modernist writers such as Wallace Stevens, Willa Cather and Wyndham Lewis and later thinkers, most notably Gilles Deleuze."Key Writings" brings together Bergson's most essential writings in a single volume, including crucial passages from such major work as "Time and Free Will," "Matter and Memory," "Creative Evolution," "Mind-Energy," "The Creative Mind," "The Two Sources of Morality and Religion" and "Laughter." The book also includes Bergson's correspondences with William James and a chronology of his life and work.