Abstract

The subject of Cumming’s large and dense book is dialectic as it developed in the existentialist tradition. Hegel is rightfully a background figure as it is Hegelian dialectic which sets the stage for the subsequent attacks and modifications upon it. The foreground and most dealt with figure in Starting Point is Søren Kierkegaard. Indeed, in one respect, one might well characterize this book primarily as an examination of Kierkegaardian dialectic as the source of and focus of most of the existentialist movement.