Q: The flip side of that is that some students, particularly in multi-disciplinary courses, find p hilosophy fascinating but overwhelming. They embark on required texts such as Heidegger’s Being and Time or something by Foucault, but they can’t understand them, there’s something missing which they expect to be there. What would you advise such students?

Charles Taylor: Well, yeah, that’s a very difficult thing, because you are quite right, sometimes, as with the work of Foucault, it can take a really big investment of time, particularly if it’s just you and the text and you’re reading it for the tenth time, asking ‘What’s going on?’ But there are some good commentaries out there. Hubert Dreyfus has written a commentary on Division One of Being and Time that I think really bridges the gap between Heidegger and anybody with a certain knowledge of philosophy in the English-speaking world. But it is certainly true that for both Heidegger and Foucault you definitely have to retool your mind (laughs). You don’t get it right away, because they’re not writing in terms immediately connected to the terms you’ve been used to.

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