“At the Existentialist Cafe: Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails” by Sarah Bakewell

This is a biography of an idea at its best. Bakewell explores the origins of existentialism tracing its roots from German phenomenology. Heidegger’s turn from protege to nemesis of the philosophical giant Husserl is depicted as a battle both of the idea of Being and the nature of what philosophy is about or should be about, in general. There is a copious amount of historical context, as no one can escape the backdrop of the two great European Wars and, particularly, Heidegger’s Nazi sympathies and what that meant for the many Jewish philosophers in his milieu. The book, however, appropriately focuses on Sartre and Beauvoir as anchors who wrestle with what it means to be human, the dialectics between master and slave, subject and object, I and you, and man and woman, what it means to live authentically, consciousness, what freedom is, what art is, as well as the role of contingency in every single life. Camus makes multiple appearances, but more as a foil to the genius rockstar philosopher Sartre. This is a shame, but in a brief overview of an entire movement, understandable. Existentialism “acknowledges the radical and terrifying scope of our freedom in life, but also the concrete influences that other philosophies tend to ignore: history, the body, social relationships and the environment.”