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Creative Evolution — Bergson’s English-language flagship
Verdict: Read this after the method and duration are in place. Its style is accessible, but its account of life and evolution is broad in scope.
- Author
- Henri Bergson
- Translator
- Arthur Mitchell
- Edition
- Dover Publications, 1998; reprint of the 1911 Henry Holt translation
- ASIN
- 0486400360
- Difficulty
- Intermediate · flagship
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What it is
Published in 1907, Creative Evolution is Bergson’s most famous and influential book, the home of the élan vital. Its worldwide fame fed into his 1927 Nobel Prize in Literature.
The central move
The book carries Bergson’s philosophy of movement and duration into the problem of life and evolution. It is accessible in style even while ranging widely.
Why it belongs here
1. It is the flagship
This is the Bergson title most prominent for English-language readers.
2. It expands the scale
The movement from lived duration to life makes it a natural third step.
3. It introduces élan vital
The concept most associated with the work appears in its full setting.
Sister-site note
This book has no matching page on the Japanese sister site. That guide emphasizes different works and uses an introductory-book slot. This English guide includes Creative Evolution plainly as the flagship work English-speaking readers most often seek.
This guide features the Dover print edition; it does not recommend a third-party public-domain Kindle edition.
This review uses only the supplied publication, reception, concept, edition, and lineup notes. It makes no first-hand reading claim.