nominally I and Thou by Martin Buber, actually just the prologue by Walter Kaufmann

Alright: I generally hate Prologues and Introductions and stuff, I think they're usually just a bad biographical summary followed by a bad pre-hashing of what you’re about to read. And, let’s be honest, they exist largely to keep a given book-object in copyright longer, they don't actually need to be there. So initially I was skipping pretty fast through the prologue of my edition (written by one Walter Kaufmann).

But soon I realised that this prologue is bats. It starts out saying how jargon is bad and alienating, and I thought it was heading for but Buber is a model of clarity or whatever, but then the next three chapters of prologue are just an incredible roast of Buber from there on out. Sample: after moving to Israel, Buber struggled because “he did not speak Hebrew well enough to write as obscurely as he did in German;” meanwhile, “most of Buber’s German readers would be incapable of saying what any number of passages probably mean.”

And then it goes on to just be the most delightfully cynical take on success of books and public intellectuals and stuff: it says that after WWII people desperately wanted a representative Jew to love, and explains who the contenders were, and why Buber won out. And that “those who love Buber also talk of Heidegger, usually without having read him,” and are into Buddhism and eastern philosophy and stuff, “the whole syndrome.”

Anyway, I don't want to misrepresent Kaufmann here, especially since he's kind enough to wish the same for Buber: after a long passage of opinions he says “Buber does not say these things, and I have no wish to saddle him with my ideas,” which seems nice.

I'm not actually sure what Kaufmann ultimately thought of I and Thou, honestly. There's some parts where it feels like he really rates it: later in the prologue (which is like 30% the length of the book) he says that Buber was deliberately difficult and wanted to be read slowly, that his style isn't the best part of the book but it is an important part of the book, etc, and that he doesn't quite remember if he learned to read by reading Buber but that you certainly can. (He then roasts newspapers for a bit, which I really enjoyed, then makes a clever-to-me observation about how Buber wants you to have a deeper I-thou relationship with his book instead of a shallow I-it one). That makes me think he actually likes the book, right? Also, you know, he went to the trouble of translating the damn thing?

On the other hand, earlier in the prologue Kaufmann says he personally prefers Buber’s Hassidim Stories, and kind of implies you'd be better off reading that, so overall the prologue didn't make me actually want to read the subsequent book. It did make me want to read Kaufmann's own book -- turns out he was a famous philosopher in his own right -- which has never happened to me before and feels kinda like wingmanning for someone and then ultimately stealing their date: super rude but also incredibly baller. What can I say? Walter Kaufmann, no choice but to stan.

p.s. eventually tried actually reading I and Thou, couldn't do it

p.p.s fun fact though: Will & Grace (the sitcom) is a reference to Buber, "the Will to go after and the Grace to receive," whatttt.