Editing Critique of Dialectical Reason (section)

{{short description|1960 book by Jean-Paul Sartre}}
{{Infobox book 
| name          = Critique of Dialectical Reason
| title_orig    = Critique de la raison dialectique
| translator    = [[Alan Sheridan|Alan Sheridan-Smith]]
| image         = Critique of Dialectical Reason (French edition).jpg
| caption       = Cover of the first edition
| author        = [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]
| illustrator   = 
| cover_artist  = 
| country       = France
| language      = French
| series        = 
| subject       = [[Marxism]]
| publisher     = [[Éditions Gallimard]]
| pub_date      = 1960 (vol. 1)<br>1985 (vol. 2)
| english_pub_date = 1976 (vol. 1)<br>1991 (vol. 2)
| media_type    = Print ([[Hardcover]] and [[Paperback]])
| pages         = 835 (English ed., vol. 1)<br>467 (English ed., vol. 2)
| isbn          = 0-86091-757-6 |isbn_note= (vol. 1)<br>0-86091-311-2 (vol. 2)
| oclc=
| preceded_by   = 
| followed_by   = 
}}
'''''Critique of Dialectical Reason''''' ({{langx|fr|Critique de la raison dialectique}}) is a 1960 book by the philosopher [[Jean-Paul Sartre]], in which the author further develops the [[existentialist]] [[Marxism]] he first expounded in his essay ''[[Search for a Method]]'' (1957).<ref name="Baldwinarticle">{{cite book |author=Baldwin, Thomas |editor=Honderich, Ted |title=The Oxford Companion to Philosophy |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |year=2005 |page=835 |isbn=0-19-926479-1 }}</ref>  ''Critique of Dialectical Reason'' and ''Search for a Method'' were written as a common manuscript, with Sartre intending the former to logically precede the latter.<ref name="Search">{{cite book |author1=Barnes, Hazel |author2=Sartre, Jean-Paul |title=Search for a Method |publisher=Vintage Books |location=New York |year=1968 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/searchformethod00jean/page/ ix-x] |isbn=0-394-70464-9 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/searchformethod00jean/page/ }}</ref> ''Critique of Dialectical Reason'' was Sartre's second large-scale philosophical treatise, ''[[Being and Nothingness]]'' (1943) having been the first.<ref name="Baldwinarticle" /> The book has been seen by some as an abandonment of Sartre's original [[existentialism]],<ref name="Kołakowski" /> while others have seen it as a continuation and elaboration of his earlier work.<ref name="Catalano" /> It was translated into English by [[Alan Sheridan|Alan Sheridan-Smith]].<ref name="Critiquevolume1" />

The first volume, "Theory of Practical Ensembles", was first published in English in 1976; a corrected English translation was published in 1991, based on the revised French edition of 1985.<ref name="Critiquevolume1">{{cite book |author=Sartre, Jean-Paul |title=Critique of Dialectical Reason Volume 1: Theory of Practical Ensembles |publisher=Verso |location=London |year=1991 |page=4 |isbn=0-86091-757-6 }}</ref> The second volume, "The Intelligibility of History", was published posthumously in French in 1985 with an English translation by [[Quintin Hoare]] appearing in 1991.<ref name="Critiquevolume2">{{cite book |author=Sartre, Jean-Paul |title=Critique of Dialectical Reason Volume 2: The Intelligibility of History |publisher=Verso |location=London |year=1991 |page=iv }}</ref>

Sartre is quoted as having said this was the principal of his two philosophical works for which he wished to be remembered.<ref>[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1975/aug/07/sartre-at-seventy-an-interview/ ''Sartre at 70: An interview''] Full text of the interview in which the author gives his opinion in the [[:en:New York Review of Books|New York Review of Books]]. Actual question (at beginning of Part II) is ''"And which of your works do you hope to see the new generation take up again?"''</ref><ref>[http://www.theinfidels.org/zunb-jeanpaulsartre.htm Infidels, Freethinkers, Humanists, and Unbelievers] ''Sartre after Literature'' ¶ 3. Typical of the secondary sources referring to the actual text in the interview.</ref>