The unavoidable as the inaccessible: an unpublished letter from Martin Heidegger

Abstract

After the events in the 30’s and the Second World War, Heidegger tries to recover his place in the public space of the philosophical debate and carefully reveal what his work consisted in during the lead years. The essay wants to place, within this context, an unpublished letter from the philosopher to Prof. Herman Zeltner, from Erlangen, in which he makes a summary of his first book published after 15 years of silence – Holzwege. In this letter, Heidegger writes about the relation between science and philosophy in the light of theontological difference, and takes into accont the question concerning technique and the turn-around, as necessary tasks of thought.