A Famous Enigma: On Alexandre Kojève: An Intellectual Biography and "The Life and Thought of Alexandre Kojève" - Cleveland Review of Books
Hacker News
February 18, 2026
AI-Generated Deep Dive Summary
Alexandre Kojève, a philosopher often invoked yet rarely read, has long been shrouded in mystery, his influence overshadowed by the reputations of his students like Jacques Lacan and Georges Bataille. Now, two new biographies—Marco Filoni’s *The Life and Thought of Alexandre Kojève* and Boris Groys’ *Alexandre Kojève: An Intellectual Biography*—seek to restore Kojève as a thinker in his own right. These works reveal that Kojève was not merely a reader of Hegel but a trailblazer who anticipated key aspects of postmodernism and the contemporary world shaped by late capitalism.
Kojève’s significance lies in his prescient understanding of life under late capitalism, particularly its bureaucratic inefficiencies and the alienation caused by automation. His concept of the “end of history” has often been misinterpreted as a triumph of liberal democracy, most notably by Francis Fukuyama in *The End of History and the Last Man*. However, Kojève’s vision was far more nuanced, shaped by his early life in Soviet Russia, his engagement with Marxist thought, and his later involvement in left Eurasianist circles and the French Resistance. His work reflects an ambivalence toward socialism and capitalism alike.
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Originally published on Hacker News on 2/18/2026