Aristotle and Arendt

Arendt had an impressive collection of Aristotle's works in her personal library. This is no surprise. After all, as Roger Berkowitz, Academic Director of the Hannah Arendt Center, wrote back in 2010, it was Aristotle who characterized humans as the only animal in possession of logos, or the ability to reason and participate in philosophical thinking. Not only that, but Aristotle also valued dramatic actions as public gestures out of which an actor's character emerges. These two ideas -- the significance of human beings' ability to think and of public action -- have since proven central to much of Hannah Arendt's philosophy.