Ebook: Time in French life and thought

Attitudes to time, whether of individuals or of epochs, reflect a certain philosophy and culture. Innovating minds and innovating cultures adopt also a new concept of time. Rabelais, Rousseau and the Romantics are cases in point. It is only in recent decades, however, that man’s changing relationship to time has been accorded attention. The French philosopher Henri Bergson played no small part in arousing interest in the subject, and his influence can be discerned in the work of Oswald Spengler and Albert Thibaudet.

In this book the author does not primarily concern himself with time as viewed by individual philosophers or entire philosophical movements, but rather looks at the significance of time for the general consciousness of a cultural era. He distinguishes the concept of time in various periods—the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the humanist and classical ages, the eighteenth century, the romantic period, the later nineteenth century and the present day. He shows how the French language has moved from primitive temporal notions to more sophisticated ones, and then gives a general definition of the prevailing attitudes during each period.