The whole adult life of the philosopher was filled with this book. Since he began to live in England, Canetti almost always worked on this book. Was it worth the effort? Maybe the world did not see other works of the author? But according to the thinker himself, he was doing what he was supposed to do. They allegedly controlled a certain force, the nature of which is difficult to understand.
Book meaning
E. Canetti worked on this work for thirty years. In a sense, the book "Mass and Power" continued the work of the French sociologist, physician Gustav Le Bon. In addition, she continues the thoughts of the philosopher from Spain, Jose Ortega y Gast, expressed in a work entitled "Rise of the Masses." These fruitful works expressed psychological, social, philosophical and political moments in the behavior of the masses and their role in the functioning of society. What is the meaning of the research that Elias Canetti conducted? “Mass and Power” is the book of his whole life. He wrote it for a very long time. What moved the great thinker, what was the main question that worried him?
The emergence of ideas
The philosopher's first thought appeared in 1925. But according to the author himself, the germ of this thought arose even during the Frankfurt demonstrations of workers after the death of von Rathenau. Then Canetti was 17 years old.
Several journalistic books, travel notes, memoirs, aphorisms published Elias Canetti. "Mass and power" is different from all his works. The book is the meaning of his life. He had high hopes for her. That is what Canetti himself said in his diary notes (1959).
During the time of writing, the philosopher has undergone a lot. But at the very beginning it was announced about the upcoming book very ambitious in order to “buckle up” to it more firmly. All friends of the author pushed for the speedy completion of the work. They have lost faith in their friend. In the soul of the author there was no anger at friends. So said Elias Canetti himself. "Mass and Power" was released in 1960. Of course, this is the largest work of the author. He examined the dialectical relationship of the problems of mass and power.
What is the similarity and difference of views with other thinkers?
It is believed that the work has much in common with a similar work by Z. Freud, "Psychology of the masses and analysis of the self." Here, the scientist turns his attention to the role of the leader in the process of mass formation and the gradual process of identifying a certain group of people, their personal "I", with the image of a leader. However, the work that Elias Canetti created (Mass and Power) is different from Freud’s. The root of the study is the action of the psychic mechanism of an individual taken separately and what causes its absorption by the mass. Canetti is interested in the problem of protection against death, as a primitive defense against which is the form of functioning of power and the behavior of the masses. After all, death prevails over everyone equally, both over the ruling and over people united in the masses.
A view from different angles
The scientist and psychologist Z. Freud, whose books are so widely known, looks at this problem from a slightly different angle. He saw the basis of the process of nominating leaders in the subconscious, in the desire of people for a kind of leader father. The thinker believed that the suppression of sexual desire can lead to transformation into leadership, dominance, and even sadism. At the same time, neurasthenia may occur, which will become a prerequisite for the search for ways to assert oneself and strive for leadership in different spheres of a person’s life.
So Freud thought. Canetti's books are a little about something else. This is a discourse on the causes of death and immortality. Reading them, it seems that you can cope with it and not die at all. However, in 1994, Elias Canetti left this world, refuting his own theory of immortality. Canetti saw death not as a natural phenomenon, but as a manifestation of ideology. For him, the Freudian death instinct of the thanatos seemed ridiculous.
Control mechanism
In addition to ideology, for the philosopher, death is the main tool that regulates the behavior of the mass by managers (authorities). He thought a lot about it. The book is a kind of exposure of the authorities. The fight against death, with such a notion as a fundamental attraction to it, Canetti associated with the opposition to the managerial system using such tools. He believed that death is already quite influential. Therefore, it is not necessary to emphasize its superiority without need. She should be expelled from anywhere where she only managed to sneak in, resist her in everything, so that she could not exert a negative influence on society and its morale. It is precisely such conclusions that come to mind when analyzing the book "Mass and Power."
Elias Canetti didn't quite see death at all. He just wanted to consider it separately from all accepted acceptable in society. This is due to the fact that people forgot that death was not always natural for them. In some nations, until relatively recently, it was considered unnatural. Each death was considered a murder. Death is that on which power parasitizes and with which it feeds. This is the mechanism that helps to manipulate people. So thought Elias Canetti.
“Mass and Power”: reviews
The perception of this philosophical work is diverse. For some, the book is easy to read and understandable, but for someone, on the contrary, it is difficult. Many believe that in this work, the author very easily and easily described rather complicated things. Thanks to the book, you can understand how people are manipulated. It reveals such social phenomena as the thirst for power and the human desire to stray into the crowd. The work describes the desire for heroism and many other points. Perhaps the author seems somewhat cynical, but it is worth noting that this cynicism is somewhat justified.
Novelty Views
For a twentieth-century society, Canetti's fundamental ideas were completely new. Although the world lives in the 21st century, the book remains relevant. After reading the work, there are reviews saying that she has a great future. Perhaps people, reflecting on the problem of mass and power, will reconsider their views over time, and much of what their minds are endowed with now will be discarded as unnecessary.
Canetti in a completely new, frank and original way illuminates the phenomenon of mass and power. There is such a thing as social distance. In other words, this is expressed as a fear of touching, when a person avoids contact with outsiders, keeps himself at a certain distance from them. In the mass, all such fears go away, and distances are eliminated. A person is psychologically discharged. Here, one person is equal to another.
What is the meaning of the phenomenon?
The mass lives a special life. She is already becoming an integral being endowed with its laws.
Power has its own phenomenon - survival. The ruler survives even when others die. He stands above all, no matter whether the living are dead, dead friends or slain enemies. This is a hero. The more those whom he survived, the more magnificent the ruler and the more he is “god-like”. True leaders always acutely feel this pattern. That is why they find the mechanisms of their elevation. The threat of death is the main instrument of mass control, and the fear of death is the motivation for the execution of any order. The voice of power, like the roar of a lion, terrifying and fleeing a herd of antelopes.
In some chapters of the book, the author reveals the initial connection between the thinking of the ruler and the paranoid, in whom dominion is such a strong obsession that it develops into a painful state. However, both are a way to realize one idea. Canetti universalizes the laws of relations of mass and power, justifies their fundamental nature.
Of course, the problem of the functioning of power and the behavior of the masses excites the minds of many scientists, philosophers, psychologists, sociologists, political scientists, public figures, writers and many other categories of citizens. But Canetti analyzed the very origin of power relations. He drew attention to the primary manifestations of human nature: nutrition, tactile sensations, imagination and fear of death. The writer is trying to recognize the very root of the origin of the moment of subordination of the masses to their leaders. He draws a parallel between leadership and paranoia, analyzes Freudian teachings and draws his own conclusions.
The main characters of the work
In general, it is believed that the book “Mass and Power” (Elias Canetti), a brief summary of which can be understood from the above, is useful and recommended for study. You can add that, reading the title, you see, as it were, two heroes of the work. In fact, there are three of them: mass, power and death. A book about their interaction and opposition. Death acts as a mediator, introducing dynamism into the interaction of the masses and power. And, as you know, these two categories are the main ones in the history of mankind. If there weren’t a third category, called death, there would be no power. So says Elias Canetti. The books of this author are widely known in the world. The main subject of Canetti's study is society and its masses. The work "Mass and Power" examines and exposes the methods and methods of manipulating the public, which are used by those in power to achieve personal goals. The book is about how power is realized, about its infernal cuisine, where ordinary people are not allowed. It’s hard to believe in the existence of this very kitchen, but all the great rulers, leaders and generals use its recipes. And it doesn’t matter, according to ready-made algorithms or just on a hunch, driven by an intuitive flawless instinct. That is how history is created.
