The Visionaries

An exhilarating journey through the lives and thought of four exceptional women whose effort to make sense of the dark times in which they lived is an essential compass for understanding our own. Deeply researched and intimately written, Eilenberger's book is an intellectual feast

Lea Ypi

What was it like to be alive during Hitler's ascent? To read this vivid, gripping book is to relive that time through four of the century's most original minds - not just their evolving ideas but their daily frustrations and fears for the future. To them, philosophy was as concrete and urgent as food or safety, and Eilenberger shows you why

Larissa MacFarquhar

This is intellectual history at its best - lucid, rigorous and readable. The Visionaries is a gripping group biography and a much-needed reminder of the power of philosophy in the face of rising authoritarianism

James McAuley

In his enjoyable book, Eilenberger manages to convey not only his characters' complicated lives but the convoluted flow of their endlessly agitated minds ... the ceaseless intellectual questing of all four makes for fascinating reading.

Caroline Moorehead, Guardian

All four women walked on the outside of power, politics, and philosophy, which is why their vision of what the world had become by the middle of the 20th century is so acute. If we want to keep our minds free in our own our own age of war and ideological absolutism, we could do worse than to retrace their steps.

Lyndsey Stonebridge, Financial Times

This book demands close attention; it rewards rereading; it tackles big ideas unapologetically. In short, Eilenberger treats you like a grown-up ... This is a wonderful book

Laura Hackett, The Sunday Times

This new book does something better: illuminates the times through which these philosophers developed their ideas - and vice versa - often drawing poignant parallels and discontinuities between the women

Stuart Jeffries, Observer