A Long Saturday: Conversations

by George Steiner

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George Steiner is one of the preeminent intellectuals of our time. The Washington Post has declared that no one else writing on literature can match him as polymath and polyglot, and few can equal the verve and eloquence of his writing, while the New York Times says of his works that the erudition is almost as extraordinary as the prose: dense, knowing, allusive. Reading in many languages, celebrating the survival of high culture in the face of modern barbarisms, Steiner probes the ethics of show more language and literature with unparalleled grace and authority. A Long Saturday offers intimate insight into the questions that have absorbed him throughout his career. In a stimulating series of conversations, Steiner and journalist Laure Adler discuss a range of topics, including Steiner's boyhood in Vienna and Paris, his education at the University of Chicago and Harvard, and his early years in academia. Books are a touchstone throughout, but Steiner and Adler's conversations also range over music, chess, psychoanalysis, the place of Israel in Jewish life, and beyond. Blending thoughts on subjects of broad interest in the humanities the issue of honoring Richard Wagner and Martin Heidegger in spite of their politics, or Virginia Woolf's awareness of the novel as a multivocal form, for example with personal reflections on life and family, Steiner demonstrates why he is considered one of today's greatest minds. Revealing and exhilarating, A Long Saturday invites readers to pull up a chair and listen in on a conversation with a master. show less

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Un libro intervista da assaporare pagina dopo pagina, con tante considerazioni su cui riflettere e pensieri da ricordare e da condividere (salvo, per quanto mi riguarda, la svalutazione di Freud). Si spazia a tutto campo, dall’educazione, all’ebraismo, alle lingue, al linguaggio, alla musica, all’Europa di ieri e di oggi, agli intellettuali ed artisti compromessi con il nazismo (Heidegger, Wagner, Céline), all’eutanasia e molto altro.
Qualche passo che mi piace ricordare, “Si può essere a casa propria dappertutto: datemi un tavolo da lavoro, sarà la mia patria” (p. 30).
“Essere ebreo … significa dirsi che il bagaglio deve essere sempre pronto, che bisogna avere la valigia sempre fatta, Senza lamentarsi, senza gridare show more l’esistenza di un’ingiustizia cosmica. No, in questo c’è anche un grande privilegio” (p. 41).
“…ebreo è chi rimane discepolo, chi impara” (p. 49).
“…due tipi di persone: quelli che leggono con una matita in mano e quelli che non lo fanno” (p. 89).
“la musica è l’esperanto dell’emozione” (p. 112).
“Senza musica la giornata è molto triste” (p. 113).
Heidegger “Un titano cattivo” (p. 115); “il più grande dei pensatori, il più meschino degli uomini” (p. 117).
Europa: “il peso del passato in Europa è enorme. Al contrario, l’avvenire pesa poco, pochissimo. Ed è un grosso problema” (p. 125). “L’Europa (…) è diventata un gigantesco museo e viverci è ormai un lusso esclusivo. Ma parlare di futuro, di un domani positivo, è difficile” (pp. 129-130).
“…credo che ci prepariamo a morire, ne sono convinto. Non sto parlando dell’incidente d’auto. Credo che siamo noi stessi ad acconsentire alla nostra morte, che il momento arriva quando siamo pronti” (p. 148).
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Steiner, toujours magnifique dans la profondeur de sa pensée.

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Author
82+ Works 7,411 Members
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris, but also lived in Vienna and New York. Steiner was a critic, novelist, philosopher, translator, and educator. Currently, he is a professor at Cambridge University and the University of Geneva. He has written for the New Yorker for over thirty years and has published the books No Passion Spent, Errata: An show more Examined Life, and Martin Heidegger: With a New Introduction. George Steiner died in Cambridge, England on February 3, 2020, at the age of 90. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

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Adler, Laure (Author)

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Common Knowledge

Canonical title*
Un long samedi. Entretiens
Original title
Un long samedi. Entretiens
Original publication date
2014 (1e édition originale française, Flammarion) (1e édition originale française, Flammarion)
People/Characters*
George Steiner (1929-2020)
Original language*
Français
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.

Classifications

Genres
Nonfiction, Biography & Memoir, Literature Studies and Criticism, Philosophy
DDC/MDS
410.92LanguageLinguisticsLinguisticsBiography And HistoryBiography
LCC
P85 .S74 .A5Language and LiteraturePhilology. LinguisticsGeneral
BISAC

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Members
66
Popularity
460,894
Reviews
2
Rating
(3.85)
Languages
5 — English, French, German, Italian, Spanish
Media
Paper, Ebook
ISBNs
10
ASINs
3