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The Spinoza Problem: A Novel
Ebook The Spinoza Problem: A Novel
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When 16-year-old Alfred Rosenberg is called into his headmaster's office for anti-Semitic remarks he made during a school speech, he is forced, as punishment, to memorize passages about Spinoza from the autobiography of the German poet Goethe. Rosenberg is stunned to discover that Goethe, his idol, was a great admirer of the Jewish 17th-century philosopher Baruch Spinoza. Long after graduation, Rosenberg remains haunted by this "Spinoza problem": How could the German genius Goethe have been inspired by a member of a race Rosenberg considers so inferior to his own, a race he was determined to destroy?
Spinoza himself was no stranger to punishment during his lifetime. Because of his unorthodox religious views, he was excommunicated from the Amsterdam Jewish community in 1656, at the age of 24, and banished from the only world he had ever known. Though his life was short and he lived without means in great isolation, he nonetheless produced works that changed the course of history.
Over the years, Rosenberg rose through the ranks to become an outspoken Nazi ideologue, a faithful servant of Hitler, and the main author of racial policy for the Third Reich. Still, his Spinoza obsession lingered. By imagining the unexpected intersection of Spinoza's life with Rosenberg's, internationally best-selling novelist Irvin D. Yalom explores the mindsets of two men separated by 300 years. Using his skills as a psychiatrist, he explores the inner lives of Spinoza, the saintly secular philosopher, and of Rosenberg, the godless mass murderer.
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Audible Audiobook
Listening Length: 14 hours and 1 minute
Program Type: Audiobook
Version: Unabridged
Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Audible.com Release Date: February 5, 2019
Whispersync for Voice: Ready
Language: English, English
ASIN: B07N44P11Z
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
This is decent historical fiction. I thought there were positives and negatives in the book which had me swinging between giving it five stars and giving it three stars.The structure of the story consists of alternating chapters describing the lives of Benedict Spinoza and Alfred Rosenberg. I thought the parallel story format was an interesting concept, and effectively done. I found that when my interest in one story waned, my interest in the other story waxed.I also liked using the relatively obscure Rosenberg as a counterpoint to Spinoza, if only because I have been translating Rosenberg’s Protestantische Rompilger. Rosenberg is something of a mystery. Notwithstanding the sometimes slighting references to him by other Nazi leaders, which becomes a theme of Yalom’s book, Rosenberg actually had quite a bit of clout and status. For example, Catholics were routinely sent to concentration camps for insulting the Myth of the Twentieth Century, which Yalom omits, and that text was used to teach Nazi leaders, which Yalom notes, and Rosenberg did win the Nazi version of the Nobel Prize, which Yalom also notes. In the book, these facts are framed to suggest that Hitler was patronizing Rosenberg, who might have something to offer the Party if his ego was stroked. Yalom certainly has a right to write his book as he wishes, but I don’t get that from the facts.That leads to my primary complaint with the book, namely that the characters are shallow and seem to be stalking horses for what I imagine is Yalom’s perspective. Thus, Rosenberg is an ineffectual, intellectually-challenged snob. Rosenberg is depicted as having been swept up Houston Stewart Chamberlain’s The Foundation of the 19th Century. I would have hoped for something more sophisticated and challenging. Treating the Nazis as imbeciles and/or having Daddy issues gets us nowhere near the question of evil in men’s souls.Likewise, the sections on Spinoza are hagiography. Everyone recognizes Spinoza as the most intelligent and virtuous person they’ve ever met. Again, this could be true, but it was laid on a bit thick. Likewise, Spinoza’s foil, a skeptical Marrano named Jacob, we get a sense of authorial approval as Jacob becomes interested in the intellectual exercise of religion and then becomes a rabbi and then ultimately decides to found a community of Liberal Jews in the East Indies who will keep tradition but jettison all that belief about God stuff. As I read this story arc, I formed a real sense of a “Mary Sue†in development. On the other hand, I liked the psychiatric conversations involving the character of Friedrich Pfister. In these conversations, we could see Yalom’s professional background.I also like the historical detective work in Yalom’s effort to uncover what a note associated with the Nazi seizure of Spinoza’s library meant by “the Spinoza problem.†Yalom postulates “the Spinoza problem†was Rosenberg’s efforts to understand how a great Geman like Goethe could be influenced by a mere Jew, or how a Jew could write such an insightful book. In truth, Yalom’s explanation is speculation – the Spinoza problem could have been something else entirely.That said, Yalom’s book sparked my interest in Spinoza. I’ve picked up Spinoza’s treatise and “A Book Forged in Hell.â€So, this book has redeeming qualities, but it also came across as a bit predictable. I question its historical accuracy, but it did keep my attention throughout.
As the author notes in his preface, it is hard to write a book about Baruch Spinoza, because most of his life was dedicated to philosophical thought, so that there isn't much of a narrative. The solution came to him when he discovered that the entire private library of Spinoza was stolen by the Nazis in 1942 under orders of Alfred Rosenberg, in many ways the ideological leader of national socialism. The result is an intriguing novel with two narrative threads that alternate between 17th century Holland and 20th century Germany. You get more than a glimpse of Spinoza's brilliant mind, so ahead of his time, but not entirely free of prejudice especially when it came to the rights of women. And you gain some insight into the troubled mind of one of the architects of the Third Reich, even though he was shunned by Hitler's inner circle for most of his life.I enjoyed learning about one of our great philosophers without having to read his actual works, which are said to be hard to understand. The author tried to pack as much as possible of Spinoza's own words into some of the passages discussing philosophy, to keep this novel from being too fictionalized (much of the story is invented, even the connection itself between Rosenberg and Spinoza). But as a result, the language in large parts of the book is very stilted. It's hard to imagine how people might have spoken in the 1600s, but there are many historical novels that do a better job of it. The many discussions between Rosenberg and his fictional psychoanalyst also appeared stilted to me. Psychoanalysis might sound like that, for all I know, but overall I didn't enjoy the dialogue in the book as much as I thought I would. It wasn't a back and forth, more a succession of very long monologues that weren't altogether convincing.Still, I found The Spinoza Problem to be an enjoyable and fairly easy read which offered new historical insights.
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