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Nemeth Thomas., Kant in Imperial Russia Cham: Springer, 2017 Pp. ix+389 ISBN 9783319529134 (hbk) £92.00
Written by an eminent and prolific specialist in Russian philosophy, this new book may be considered the definitive, comprehensive and authoritative overview of the Kantrezeption in pre-Soviet Russia in the English language. The book proceeds chronologically, from Kant’s days up to the Bolshevik Revolution, examining well-known and lesser known Russian philosophers and thinkers as well as figures of other nationalities who contributed to the dissemination of Kant’s ideas in Russia. After the beginning of the Seven Years War, when Königsberg was under Russian occupation (1758–63), Kant was literally living within the Russian Empire. From this ensues a discussion of Kant’s relationship with occupying military units stationed in his hometown as well as with some Russian intellectuals, among whom was Nikolai Karamzin, who paid Kant a visit during his travels. Other persons of interest for the earliest period of Kant’s reception in Russia were Johann Schaden and Wilhelm Mellmann, who were among the first to teach his ideas in Russia.
The author then turns to early nineteenth-century reactions to Kant. Aleksandr Lubkin was apparently the first to give a detailed critique of Kant’s philosophy in his ‘Letters on Critical Philosophy’ (1805), in which he accused Kant of subjectivism and of mathematical psychologism. Then, in 1819, Jan Śniadecki published an article in which he accused Kant of being unable to prove his basic premises, of making fanciful divisions, and of metaphysical mysticism. The author also examines invited German professors and Russian professors such as Philipp Reinhard, Johann Buhle, Lev Cvetaev, Johann Fincke, Gavril Solncev and Vasilij Perevoshchikov. The latter, who is characterized as one of the most outspoken reactionaries to the Copernican revolution in philosophy, is said to have ‘charged Kant with an extreme epistemological subjectivism, a charge that would reverberate through the decades ahead in Russia’ (p. 49). One emerging trend thus far is that invited German professors were generally ‘sympathetic to Kantianism, or at least to German Idealism, whereas those most outspoken against it were native Russians’ (p. 41).
The author then moves to the period of the reign of Tsar Nicholas I (1825–55), which he characterizes as a philosophical dark age. Despite the perilousness of practising philosophy during...