At the edition's information booth in the Rost- und Silberlaube of the FU Berlin, visitors were able to find out about the edition's work in conversation with the staff of the Complete Works. In the spirit of “beginning”, which Arendt saw as a central moment of political action, there were stickers with Arendt quotes and sachets of flower seeds to take home.

In the adjacent computer room, Hannah Arendt quizzes for all ages were awaiting the guests, in which they could test their knowledge on the critical thinker and win candy. On a typewriter, visitors had the opportunity to create their own typescript and get a sense of the writing process, or to gain their first experience with transcription by working on Arendt's revisions. Those who were interested in learning more about the practice of editing could join our transcription team to take a look behind the scenes of the Critical Edition and gain insights into the digital editing of Arendt’s texts.

According to the results of our quiz, our visitors were actually in broad agreement – fewer than 5% believed that Origins of Totalitarianism was not written by Arendt. We are therefore all the more delighted that Volume 5, The Origins of Totalitarianism / Elemente und Ursprünge totaler Herrschaft, will celebrate its book launch next week, and will now be available in a critically edited version. 

We would like to thank all visitors for their interest, their questions and their participation – it was an event full of exciting, wonderful encounters, and we are looking forward to next year!