The Remaking of Thomas Mann

In the spring of 1929, a philosophical debate was held in the resort town of Davos, Switzerland, that historians now see as a defining moment for the history of twentieth-century European thought. The debate’s central question, of Kantian inspiration, was: “What is it to be a human being?” Called to address it were two of the most important philosophers of the moment: Ernst Cassirer (1874–1945) and Martin Heidegger (1889–1976).