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FROM THE LETTERS TO MEDARD BOSS, 1947-1971


back in their own way to the question of "grounding" [Begründung] and of the "ground" [Grund], in which the problem of causality also has its root. The manuscripts I have here came to my aid in this. Some things in them proved to be outdated; but otherwise there is a mountain [of manuscripts] here, which surely must remain "posthumous works." .. .

I have often thought of you and your family over there. But your fear that our friendship could be spoiled somehow by the "travel problem" in spring is completely unfounded. If such a thing could happen, our friendship would not have grown in the right soil from the beginning.

It was a sincere joy to me that your presentations in Paris were a genuine hit.. .. But prior to your journey to India, we must by all means still have ample time to see and to talk to each other.

We will be at the hut from the middle of July until the end of August. Then I have to go to France, namely, to Cerisy, a castle in Normandy where the meetings in Pontigny, founded before the First World War, will be reestablished. My wife and I have been invited there for a week, and before that we would like to be in Paris and its surroundings at the end of August. I imagined that the whole thing would be very "private"—but now the whole of France already seems to know about it. They are already reporting the plan to Germany so that our people from Freiburg and from other places also want to be present in France with us. To be someone with a famous name is a gruesome thing. Even the Foreign Institute in Stuttgart has sought me out here and has sent a Japanese person, who invited me to Japan for several months during next year.

When I am by myself daily or with my brother, who is not in great [316] shape—he is too isolated here and too overworked by the bank to initiate something on his own—when we were walking along the country road or through the woods, the business of the world seemed like an insane asylum.* My plans are still uncertain for fall. Much depends on how I get the discussion about language on the right track. The issue becomes darker by the day, and at the same time, more exciting. Today I am amazed that years ago I dared to give the lecture on language. The greatest omission belongs to the fact that the possibility for a sufficient discussion about the East Asian languages is lacking . . .


I greet you in cordial friendship,


Yours,
Martin Heidegger



* Heidegger's brother Fritz Heidegger was an employee of the Volksbank in Heidegger's native Messkirch.-TRANSLATORS


Zollikon Seminars by Martin Heidegger