ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the interpretations of Kant by Martin Heidegger and JeanFrançois Lyotard, in order to provide a context and a framework for the reading of Kant which is developed later in the book. Each thinker produces an original work of philosophy which is influenced by Kant, and then each writes an important interpretation of Kantian critical philosophy. Heidegger writes Being and Time, and follows it with Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics; Lyotard writes The Differend and later Lessons on the Analytic of the Sublime.1 Heidegger provides important tools or categories for continental philosophical interpretation of Kant: subjectivity, imagination, temporality, and schematism. Heidegger reinterprets the Critique of Pure Reason in a forceful way that opposes Neo-Kantian idealism and its focus upon the Critique of Practical Reason. Lyotard reinterprets the Critique of Judgment along Heideggerian lines, and makes his reading of the Third Critique the model for knowing in his philosophy. One way to summarize their respective interpretations would be to say that Heidegger ontologizes Kant, whereas Lyotard linguicizes Kant. This claim should become clear during the course of the chapter.
