The Life of the Mind

By: Hannah Arendt

Narrated by: Laural Merlington

Considered by many to be Hannah Arendt's greatest work, published as she neared the end of her life, The Life of the Mind investigates thought itself, as it exists in contemplative life. In a shift from her previous writings, most of which focus on the world outside the mind, this work was planned as three volumes that would explore the activities of the mind considered by Arendt to be fundamental. What emerged is a rich, challenging analysis of human mental activity, considered in terms of thinking, willing, and judging.   

This final achievement, presented here in a complete one-volume edition, may be seen as a legacy to our own and future generations.

©1971 Hannah Arendt; copyright 1977, 1978 by Harcourt, Inc. (P)2018 Tantor

love the book, Hannah is a master.

but listen to it at 1.5x speed and thank me later. apparently the pronunciations and accents are atrocious, but she said Husserl in a way that made me laugh, so she's alright by my measure.

Thought-provoking and well-executed

I'm very happy that Arendt's last work is available as an audiobook. It gave me a chance to "prelisten" to the book as a whole before focusing on particular places with a print version. Laural Merlington does an excellent job overall, and just has some trouble with pronunciation of German and Latin. It would be a tall order, I think, to expect her to read fluently not only English and French, but also German, Latin, and Ancient Greek that come up throughout the book.

Well Read, Articulate and Expressive

I enjoyed this book, reading several times over the last few weeks and thinking about all the authors I have read and she has read of people who think and those surrounding them who take their work and try to publish what they think they must mean and as in the end she discusses how that work as they find the empty page and try to assemble words and ideas here and there and I am reminded even until know one still understands Hitlers Meanings in his book, in his speech’s, his writings because he was very well read. So when does society decided whom to publish and who not too. As Hannah discusses Nietzsche did not write Will to Power but didn’t mention that his sister did and in those writings are changes in meaning, understanding even from as she discusses KJV to who knows what. Many times I find in my daily discussions I say things that no one understands because they do not read which you to will find once you start reading more and more. Do you know that the whole world was deceived and I ask you to think why do NOT virus’s jump species, which is BIO 101, and yet the whole world was believing the Wuhan Blood mixture caused …. READ MORE! READ MORE, READ and educated yourselves and THINK on what you read.

Need a better reader

An enlightening and challenging read but fulfilling. The reader, however, though deliberate and clear overall, could have been better at her Latin and German. This weakness was a distraction throughout. But I would rather have an Audible of this book than none at all. This narration was good enough to be helpful.

A great book marred by shockingly poor narration

Hannah Arendt is one of the great German intellectuals of the 20th century and this is a wonderful introduction to her thought.
But I suggest reading it in book form rather than this audible version.
The narrator is unused to philosophical material, cannot pronounce the names of some of the world's great philosophers and is incapable of pronouncing non-English words in a comprehensible fashion. Heidegger is pronounced as "Hydecker", Paul Valery becomes Paul Velery (rhymes with celery) and the introductory quotes to each chapter in French, German and Latin are butchered completely beyond comprehension for a speaker of those languages. It is shocking that this could happen to such an important book.
Audible should re-record the foreign language parts with a narrator who can pronounce the words properly, preferably someone who speaks both German and French. This recording is potentially damaging to the reputation of all involved and I am sorry to say should be promptly corrected without regard to cost.