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Time and Free Will — duration and freedom at the foundation
Verdict: The most self-contained of Bergson’s major works and the best place to meet the core argument in full, once you understand what he means by intuition.
- Author
- Henri Bergson
- Translator
- F. L. Pogson
- Edition
- Dover Publications, 2001; reprint of the 1913 Allen & Unwin translation
- ASIN
- 0486417670
- Difficulty
- Intermediate · core primary text
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What it is
This 1889 doctoral thesis is the foundation of Bergson’s system. It corresponds to “jikan” on the Japanese sister site.
The central move
Bergson distinguishes the spatialized time used by science—the measurable sequence of identical units—from durée, the qualitative flow of consciousness in which moments interpenetrate. He uses that distinction to defend free will.
Why it matters
1. The core concept appears directly
Duration is not background terminology here; it drives the argument.
2. The question is focused
The book connects the account of lived time to a single central problem: freedom.
3. It stands on its own
Among the major works, it offers the most self-contained route into Bergson’s argument.
Edition note
This guide features the Dover print edition. Third-party public-domain Kindle editions exist, but no Kindle edition is recommended here.
This review is grounded only in the supplied work, translation, edition, and argument notes. It makes no first-hand reading claim.