A Guide to Heidegger's Being and Time (Contemporary Contin Philosophy)

Reading the original text of Being and Time is a daunting task. Magda King effectively breaks down the author's arguments and addresses them, one by one, in a rigorous but readable fashion.This book is highly recommended for students of the text, as well as for people (like myself) who already consider themselves familiar with it. Whichever camp you fall into, you will end up learning something new.

excellent

Helpful

I have read several commentaries on Heidegger and this is the worst. At times King's writing is more difficult than Heidegger's. Any other commentary would be better like Dreyfus, Gelven, etc.

As the backcover promised, King's lectures/commentary are quite easy to understand and move at a brisque but manageable pace. She doesn't dwell on minute issues in the text, but chooses instead to survey (generally) all the major (and quite difficult) concepts which Heidegger introduces in S&Z. At times I wished that King discussed matters in more detail: no mention of sec. 42 and the myth of care, or much discussion of the "Cartesian" metaphysic which is so central to H's "Abbau"; but as a first time reader of S&Z, perhaps this was the best thing for me, that I solidify my understanding of key terms and ideas before delving into more contentious matters of interpretation. My experience was only slightly frustrated by the fact that I read the Maccquarrie translation and not the newer Stambaugh, which she uses.

The book was published by a New York publisher, but the copy I got was printed by Amazon, don’t know if it’s against the law.The Amazon store even use a blur copy photo for the cover. It was super low quality.