SEX & CHARACTER

Die Umschau.—“Dr. Otto Weininger’s book is destined to place therelation of the sexes in a new light. He traces the contrast between manand woman to a single principle, and makes an attempt to reduce thespiritual differences of the sexes to a system.”

Allgemeine Wiener Medizinische Zeitung.—“An extraordinary book,that called forth the learned criticism of two faculties, and had appearedin a third edition a few months after its publication, before the scientificworld had been able to pronounce upon it seriously, not to say finally....A book that will henceforth be in the hands of every doctor who hasoccasion to study the antithetical character of the two sexes.”

Der Volkserzieher.—“There is no aspect of modern thought which he(Weininger) has not touched upon in the course of his investigations, norecess of the labyrinthine modern soul into which he does not invite us toglance with him, no question on which he has not touched, or to which hehas not, indeed, offered a solution in accordance with his own philosophy.”

Allgemeine Zeitung.—“This book ... is a sensational work, both byreason of its contents and of the tragic fate of its author. Weininger, asis commonly known, shot himself in the autumn of 1903 at the early ageof twenty-three, in the house in Vienna where Beethoven had died....But it is the book itself, even more than its author’s individuality, which isabnormal. It is nothing less than an attempt to construct a system ofsexual characterology on the broadest scientific basis, with all the resourcesof the most modern philosophy.”

Münchener Neueste Nachrichten.—“‘Sex and Character,’ by Dr.Weininger, has none of the character of a youthful work. The learningrevealed in this book, and indeed its whole conception, are such that wemight take it for the strenuous achievement of a lifetime.”

Neues Wiener Tageblatt.—“A great philosophical, biological, andsocial question is here treated by a gifted and learned author with perfectfreedom and breadth, yet with a seriousness, a wealth of scientific knowledge,that would ensure the book a place in the front rank, even were thestyle less excellent, vivacious, and individual than it is.”

Die Wage.—“The author is a brilliant stylist. On every page I findaphorisms, in which the form fits the thought like a veil of silver. Andthese thoughts are no ordinary ones. The writer goes his own way, heknows secret paths which no man has yet trodden, and he shrinks from noobstacles. He lets himself down cautiously into the abyss, for he hasdetermined to sound the deepest depths; from time to time, however, helooks up from the pit and rejoices in the light of the eternal stars, eventhough they lie hid from his mortal vision. He carries his arguments totheir ultimate conclusion. We rebel against these conclusions, but weadmire the uncompromising logic of the thinker.”