When discussing the great essayists of our time, the name Jan Philipp Reemtsma inevitably comes up. The literary scholar, philosopher, and violence researcher has made a name for himself as a combative "public intellectual." Above all, he has repeatedly distinguished himself as a brilliant reader and interpreter of literary texts. He has dedicated equally brilliant pieces to Homer and Shakespeare, Lessing and Wieland, Ernst Jünger and Arno Schmidt, Imre Kertész and Stephen King, as well as to fundamental questions of literary theory. This three-volume edition contains all of his important writings on literature. Jan Philipp Reemtsma's writings on literature are not only a richly filled treasure trove of world literature but also a high school of reading. His essays traverse epochs, works, genres, and authors, illuminating the sublime as well as the absurd, the radical, and more.