In thirteen chapters, the book brings together a diverse range of dialogues between thinkers of the European tradition and Lévinas's expressive phenomenology of otherness, represented first and foremost by Totalitarianism and Infinity. The common aim of the essays is to contribute to the reflection and further development of Lévinas' philosophy, which is conceived as a radical polemic with the fundamental currents of the European philosophical tradition. Because Lévinas develops his thought as a confrontation that produces sharp polarities, the reader of his work is confronted with the question of how far it is philosophically legitimate and bearing. The answer to this question, which is the common thread of this publication, therefore takes the form of dialogical essays in which Lévinas is confronted anew with thinkers who have significantly influenced his position, as well as with those who, though without direct influence, think the same topics from different starting points. The book therefore includes confrontations with Hegel's notion of the relation to the other, Kant's idea of autonomy, Heidegger's elaboration of fundamental ontology, and Husserl's phenomenology. On the other hand, it also includes interviews with thinkers who share with Lévinas motifs such as corporeality (Patočka) or relational existence in relation to the other (Sartre, Merleau-Ponty) and to God (Keirkegaard, Buber). There is also the theme of thought of differentiation and negation (Derrida, Adorno), the motif of vulnerability (Butler), mortality and the relation to language (Blanchot).
Czech edition