Editing Eric Hoffer

{{Short description|American moral and social conservative philosopher (1902–1983)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=October 2012}}
{{Infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] -->
|name = Eric Hoffer
|image = Eric Hoffer in LBJ Oval Office.jpg
|image_size = 250px
|caption = Eric Hoffer in 1967, in the [[Oval Office]], visiting President [[Lyndon Baines Johnson]]
|birth_date = {{birth date|1902|7|25|mf=y}}
|birth_place = [[New York City]], [[New York (state)|New York]], U.S.
|death_date = {{death date and age|mf=yes|1983|5|21|1902|7|25}}
|death_place = [[San Francisco]], [[California]], U.S.
|occupation = Author, [[Dockworker|longshoreman]]
|genre = [[Social psychology]], [[political science]]
|awards = [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]], 1983
}}

'''Eric Hoffer''' (July 25, 1902 – May 21, 1983)<ref>{{Cite encyclopedia| url= https://www.britannica.com/biography/Eric-Hoffer|title=Eric Hoffer {{!}} American writer| encyclopedia= Encyclopedia Britannica| via= britannica.com |access-date= 2017-10-09}}</ref> was an American philosopher and social critic. A conservative moderate with an atypical working-class background, Hoffer authored ten books over his career and was awarded the [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]] in February 1983. His first book, ''[[The True Believer]]'' (1951), was widely recognized as a classic, receiving critical acclaim from both scholars and laymen,<ref name="EB">{{cite encyclopedia |  title = Hoffer, Eric | encyclopedia = Encyclopædia Britannica| year = 2003 | edition= Ultimate Reference Suite CD-ROM | publisher = Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.}}</ref> although Hoffer believed that ''The Ordeal of Change'' (1963) was his finest work.<ref>According to longtime companion Lili Fabilli Osborne, executrix of the Hoffer Estate; also noted in personal archives stored at [[the Hoover Institute]].</ref> The Eric Hoffer Book Award is an international literary prize established in his honor.<ref>[https://www.hofferaward.com/Eric-Hoffer-Award-description.html The Eric Hoffer Book Award] was established in 2007 with permission from the Eric Hoffer Estate.</ref> The [[University of California, Berkeley]] awards an annual literary prize named jointly for Hoffer.<ref>{{cite web| url= https://grad.berkeley.edu/news/announcements/opportunities/fabilli-hoffer-prize/| title=Fabili Hoffer Prize| website = grad.berkeley.edu| date=November 14, 2018| publisher=[[University of California, Berkeley]]| access-date=25 July 2021}}</ref>

==Early life==
Many elements of Hoffer's early life are unverified,<ref name= "hoover">{{cite web| url= http://www.hoover.org/research/longshoreman-philosopher| title=The Longshoreman Philosopher | publisher= Hoover Institution | website = hoover.org| access-date=6 April 2015}}</ref> but in autobiographical statements, Hoffer claimed to have been born in 1902<ref>{{cite web | url= https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1961-27792-3041-44?cc=2000219 | title=California > Monterey > Monterey Judicial Township > 27-34 Monterey Judicial Township outside Monterey City bounded by (N) township line; (E) township line; (S) Highway 117; (W) Monterey City Limits, Highway 56; also Seaside (part) > image 102 of 126; citing NARA digital publication of T627 | work=United States Census | year = 1940 | via=FamilySearch.org |accessdate= 22 December 2014 | publisher = National Archives and Records Administration| place = Washington, DC}}</ref><ref name= "hoover" /> in [[The Bronx]], [[New York City]], [[New York (state)|New York]], to Knut and Elsa (Goebel) Hoffer.<ref name="bookref1">{{cite book| last=Knutson|first=Harold|title=Annual Obituary 1983|publisher=St. James| year=1984|page=254|isbn=0-912289-07-4}}</ref> His parents were immigrants from [[Alsace]], then part of [[Imperial Germany]]. By age five, Hoffer could already read in both [[English language|English]] and his parents' native [[German language|German]].<ref name="Truth Imagined">''Truth Imagined''</ref><ref name="hoover.org">{{cite web |url= http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/3063261.html |title=Archived copy |access-date=2006-12-29 |url-status= dead |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070525200245/http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/3063261.html |archive-date=May 25, 2007 |df=mdy-all }}</ref> When he was five, his mother fell down the stairs with him in her arms. He later recalled, "I lost my sight at the age of seven. Two years before, my mother and I fell down a flight of stairs. She did not recover and died in that second year after the fall. I lost my sight and, for a time, my memory."<ref>''Truth Imagined'', p. 1</ref> Hoffer spoke with a pronounced German accent all his life, and spoke the language fluently. He was raised by a live-in relative or servant, a German immigrant named Martha. His eyesight inexplicably returned when he was 15. Fearing he might lose it again, he seized on the opportunity to read as much as he could. His recovery proved permanent, but Hoffer never abandoned his reading habit.

Hoffer was a young man when he also lost his father. The [[cabinetmaker]]'s [[trade union|union]] paid for Knut Hoffer's funeral and gave Hoffer about $300 insurance money. He took a bus to [[Los Angeles]] and spent the next 10 years wandering, as he remembered, "up and down the land, dodging hunger and grieving over the world."<ref name= "The Longshoreman and the Masses">{{cite web|title=The Longshoreman and the Masses| url= https://www.theattic.space/home-page-blogs/2019/6/19/the-working-mans-philosopher |website=The Attic| date= June 19, 2019 |access-date=31 July 2019}}</ref> Hoffer eventually landed on [[Skid Row, Los Angeles|Skid Row]], reading, occasionally writing, and working at [[Handyman|odd jobs]].<ref name= "Truth Imagined"/>

In 1931, he considered [[suicide]] by drinking a solution of [[oxalic acid]], but he could not bring himself to do it.<ref>''Truth Imagined'', pp. 35–39</ref> He left Skid Row and became a [[migrant worker]], following the harvests in California. He acquired a [[library card]] where he worked, dividing his time "between the books and the [[brothel]]s." He also [[prospecting|prospected for gold]] in the mountains. Snowed in for the winter, he read the ''[[Essays (Montaigne)|Essays]]'' by [[Michel de Montaigne]]. Montaigne impressed Hoffer deeply, and Hoffer often made reference to him. He also developed a respect for America's [[underclass]], which he said was "lumpy with talent."

==Career==
He wrote a novel, ''Four Years in Young Hank's Life,'' and a [[novella]], ''Chance and Mr. Kunze,'' both partly autobiographical. He also penned a long article based on his experiences in a federal work camp, "Tramps and Pioneers." It was never published, but a truncated version appeared in ''[[Harper's Magazine]]'' after he became well known.<ref>{{cite book |last=Bethell |first=Tom |year=2012 |title=The Longshoreman Philosopher |publisher=Hoover Institution Press Publication |page=54 |isbn=978-0817914158 |author-link=Tom Bethell }}</ref>

Hoffer tried to enlist in the [[U.S. Army]] at age 40 during [[World War II]], but he was rejected due to a [[hernia]].<ref>[http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/3063261.html  Hoover Digest – The Longshoreman Philosopher], [[Hoover Institution]] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070525200245/http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/3063261.html |date=May 25, 2007 }}</ref> Instead, he began work as a [[longshoreman]] on [[Embarcadero (San Francisco)|the docks of San Francisco]] in 1943.<ref name="aei.org">{{cite web|url=https://www.aei.org/articles/eric-hoffer-longshoreman-philosopher/|last=Bethell|first=Tom|title=Eric Hoffer: Longshoreman Philosopher|work=[[American Enterprise Institute]] – AEI |date=26 May 2013|publisher=AEI.org|access-date=25 July 2021}}</ref> At the same time, he began to write seriously.

Hoffer left the docks in 1964, and shortly after became an adjunct professor at the [[University of California, Berkeley]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.hoover.org/research/longshoreman-philosopher|last=Bethell|first=Tom|title=The Longshoreman Philosopher|publisher=[[The Hoover Institution]]|date=30 January 2003|access-date=25 July 2021}}</ref> He later retired from public life in 1970.<ref name="google2">{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=I8gsAAAAIBAJ&pg=4979%2C1459863 |title= Philosopher Hoffer dies |newspaper=[[Star-News]] |date=May 22, 1983|access-date=6 April 2015}} {{Dead link|date=July 2021}}</ref> "I'm going to crawl back into my hole where I started," he said. "I don't want to be a public person or anybody's spokesman... Any man can ride a train. Only a wise man knows when to get off."<ref name="The Longshoreman and the Masses"/> In 1970, he endowed the Lili Fabilli and Eric Hoffer [[Laconic phrase|Laconic]] Essay Prize for students, faculty, and staff at the [[University of California, Berkeley]].

Hoffer called himself an [[atheist]] but had sympathetic views of [[religion]] and described it as a positive force.<ref>{{cite book|title=Eric Hoffer: The Longshoreman Philosopher|year=2012|publisher=[[Hoover Press]]|isbn=978-0817914165|page=7|author=Thomas Bethell|quote=Hoffer's attitude toward religion was hard to pin down. He generally described himself as an atheist, yet during our interview he described religion as a significant source of leadership}}</ref>

He died at his home in San Francisco in 1983 at the age of 80.<ref name="google3">{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=d3w1AAAAIBAJ&dq=eric%20hoffer%20death&pg=3571%2C3308158 |title= Death claims waterfront philosopher |newspaper=[[Rome News-Tribune]] |date=May 22, 1983 |access-date=6 April 2015}}</ref>

==Working-class roots==
Hoffer was influenced by his modest roots and working-class surroundings, seeing in it vast human potential. In a letter to [[Margaret Caroline Anderson|Margaret Anderson]] in 1941, he wrote: "My writing is done in railroad yards while waiting for a freight, in the fields while waiting for a truck, and at noon after lunch. Towns are too distracting." He once remarked, "my writing grows out of my life just as a branch from a tree." When he was called an [[intellectual]], he insisted that he simply was a longshoreman. Hoffer has been [[philosopher nicknames|dubbed]] by some authors a "longshoreman philosopher."<ref name="hoover.org" /><ref>{{cite news|last=Dirda |first=Michael |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/book-world-eric-hoffer-the-longshoreman-philosopher-by-tom-bethell/2012/05/09/gIQAasr0DU_story.html |title=Book World: Blue-collar intellectual by 'Eric Hoffer: The Longshoreman Philosopher' |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=2012-05-09 |access-date=2019-01-16}}</ref>

==Personal life==
Hoffer, who was an [[only child]], never married. He fathered a child with Lili Fabilli Osborne, named Eric Osborne, who was born in 1955 and raised by Lili Osborne and her husband, Selden Osborne.<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.bgdailynews.com/features/book-review-longshoreman-philosopher-resurrects-hoffer/article_d82de3cc-d2e3-11e1-a82d-001a4bcf887a.html| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20200805021018/https://www.bgdailynews.com/features/book-review-longshoreman-philosopher-resurrects-hoffer/article_d82de3cc-d2e3-11e1-a82d-001a4bcf887a.html| url-status = dead| archive-date = August 5, 2020| title = Longshoreman philosopher| date = July 22, 2012}}</ref> Lili Fabilli Osborne had become acquainted with Hoffer through her husband, a fellow longshoreman and acquaintance of Hoffer's. Despite this, Selden Osborne and Hoffer remained on good terms.<ref name="aei.org"/>

Hoffer referred to Eric Osborne as his son or [[godson]]. Lili Fabilli Osborne died in 2010 at the age of 93.  Prior to her death, Osborne was the [[executor]] of Hoffer's estate, and vigorously controlled the rights to his [[intellectual property]].

In his 2012 book ''Eric Hoffer: The Longshoreman Philosopher,'' journalist [[Tom Bethell]] revealed doubts about Hoffer's account of his early life. Although Hoffer claimed his parents were from [[Alsace-Lorraine]], Hoffer himself spoke with a pronounced [[Bavarian language|Bavarian]] accent.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Bethell |first1=Tom |title=Eric Hoffer, Genius{{snd}}and Enigma |url=https://www.hoover.org/research/eric-hoffer-genius-and-enigma |website=[[Hoover Institution|Hoover.org]] |access-date=2019-05-11 |date=2012-04-06}}</ref> He claimed to have been born and raised in the [[The Bronx|Bronx]] but had no [[Bronx accent]]. His lover and executor Lili Fabilli stated that she always thought Hoffer was an immigrant. Her son, Eric Fabilli, said that Hoffer's life might have been comparable to that of [[B. Traven]] and considered hiring a genealogist to investigate Hoffer's early life, to which Hoffer reportedly replied, "Are you ''sure'' you want to know?" [[Pescadero, California|Pescadero]] land-owner Joe Gladstone, a family friend of the Fabillis who also knew Hoffer, said of Hoffer's account of his early life: "I don't believe a word of it." To this day, no one ever has claimed to have known Hoffer in his youth, and no records apparently exist of his parents, nor indeed of Hoffer himself until he was about forty, when his name appeared in a census.

==Books and opinions==

===''The True Believer''===
{{main article|The True Believer}}
Hoffer came to public attention with the 1951 publication of his first book, ''The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements'', which consists of a preface and 125 sections, which are divided into 18 chapters. Hoffer analyzes the phenomenon of "mass movements," a general term that he applies to revolutionary parties, nationalistic movements, and religious movements. He summarizes his thesis in §113:  "A movement is pioneered by men of words, materialized by fanatics and consolidated by men of actions."<ref>Eric Hoffer, ''The True Believer'' (New York: Harper & Row/Perennial Library, 1966), p. 134.</ref>

Hoffer argues that [[fanaticism|fanatical]] and extremist cultural movements, whether religious, social, or national, arise when large numbers of frustrated people, believing their own individual lives to be worthless or spoiled, join a movement demanding radical change. But the real attraction for this population is an escape from the self, not a realization of individual hopes:  "A mass movement attracts and holds a following not because it can satisfy the desire for self-advancement, but because it can satisfy the passion for self-renunciation."<ref>Eric Hoffer, ''The True Believer'' (New York: Harper & Row/Perennial Library, 1966), p. 21.</ref>

Hoffer consequently argues that the appeal of mass movements is interchangeable: in the Germany of the 1920s and the 1930s, for example, the [[Communists]] and [[National Socialists]] were ostensibly enemies, but sometimes enlisted each other's members, since they competed for the same kind of marginalized, angry, frustrated people.  For the "true believer," Hoffer argues that particular beliefs are less important than escaping from the burden of the autonomous self.

Harvard historian [[Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.]] said of ''The True Believer'':  "This brilliant and original inquiry into the nature of mass movements is a genuine contribution to our social thought."<ref>Eric Hoffer, ''The True Believer'' (Harper & Row/Perennial Library, 1966), back cover.</ref>

===Later works===
Subsequent to the publication of ''The True Believer'' (1951), Eric Hoffer touched upon Asia and American interventionism in several of his essays. In "The Awakening of Asia" (1954), published in ''The Reporter'' and later his book ''The Ordeal of Change'' (1963), Hoffer discusses the reasons for unrest on the continent. In particular, he argues that the root cause of social discontent in Asia was not government corruption, "communist agitation," or the legacy of European colonial "oppression and exploitation," but rather that a "craving for pride" was the central problem in Asia, suggesting a problem that could not be relieved through typical American intervention.<ref name="reporter">{{cite journal|title='The Awakening of Asia', by Eric Hoffer|journal=The Reporter|date= June 22, 1954|pages=16–17}}</ref>

During the [[Vietnam War]], despite his objections to the antiwar movement and acceptance of the notion that the war was somehow necessary to prevent a [[third world war]], Hoffer remained skeptical concerning American interventionism, specifically the intelligence with which the war was being conducted in Southeast Asia. After the United States became more involved in the war, Hoffer wished to avoid defeat in Vietnam because of his fear that such a defeat would transform American society for ill, opening the door to those who would preach a [[stab-in-the-back myth]] and allow for the rise of an American version of Hitler.<ref name="google">{{cite book|title=Eric Hoffer; an American odyssey|author=Tomkins, C.|date=1968|publisher=Dutton |url=https://archive.org/details/erichofferameric00tomk|url-access=registration|access-date=27 October 2014|isbn=0-8057-7359-2}}</ref>

In ''The Temper of Our Time'' (1967), Hoffer implies that the United States as a rule should avoid interventions in the first place: "the better part of statesmanship might be to know clearly and precisely what not to do, and leave action to the improvisation of chance." In fact, Hoffer indicates that "it might be wise to wait for enemies to defeat themselves," as they might fall upon each other with the United States out of the picture. The view was somewhat borne out with the [[Cambodian-Vietnamese War]] and [[Chinese-Vietnamese War]] of the late 1970s.

==Papers==
Hoffer's papers, including 131 of the notebooks he carried in his pockets, were acquired in 2000 by the [[Hoover Institution Archives]]. The papers fill {{convert|75|ft|m}} of shelf space. Because Hoffer cultivated an [[aphorism|aphoristic]] style, the unpublished notebooks (dated from 1949 to 1977) contain very significant work. Although available for scholarly study since at least 2003, little of their contents has been published. A selection of fifty aphorisms, focusing on the development of unrealized human talents through the [[creativity|creative process]], appeared in the July 2005 issue of ''[[Harper's Magazine]]''.<ref>[[Tom Bethell]], "Sparks: Eric Hoffer and the Art of the Notebook", ''Harper's Magazine'', July 2005, pp. 73–77 ([https://www.scribd.com/doc/38214/The-Art-of-the-Notebook-Eric-Hoffer complete article on scribd]).</ref>

==Published works==
:1951 ''[[The True Believer|The True Believer: Thoughts On The Nature of Mass Movements]]''. {{ISBN|0-06-050591-5}}
:1955 ''The Passionate State of Mind, and Other Aphorisms''. {{ISBN|1-933435-09-7}}
:1963 ''The Ordeal of Change''. {{ISBN|1-933435-10-0}}
:1967 ''The Temper of Our Time''. {{ISBN|978-1-933435-22-0}}
:1968  ''Nature and The City''
:1969 ''Working and Thinking on the Waterfront: A Journal, June 1958 to May 1959''
:1971 ''First Things, Last Things''
:1973 ''Reflections on the Human Condition''. {{ISBN|1-933435-14-3}}
:1976 ''In Our Time''
:1979 ''Before the Sabbath''
:1982 ''Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer''. {{ISBN|0-06-014984-1}}
:1983 ''Truth Imagined''. {{ISBN|1-933435-01-1}}

==Interviews==
* ''Conversations with Eric Hoffer'', twelve-part television interview by [[James Day (journalist)|James Day]] of [[KQED (TV)|KQED]], San Francisco, 1963.<ref>{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/details/vanishingvisioni00dayj/page/50 | title=The Vanishing Vision: The Inside Story of Public Television | publisher=Berkeley: University of California Press | author=Day, James | author-link=James Day (journalist) | year=1995 | pages=[https://archive.org/details/vanishingvisioni00dayj/page/50 50–51] | isbn=0520086597 }}</ref>
* "Eric Hoffer: The Passionate State of Mind" with Eric Sevareid, CBS, September 19, 1967<ref name="Eric Hoffer papers">{{cite web | url=https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt0n39n6dd/dsc/ | title=Register of the Eric Hoffer papers | publisher=[[California Digital Library]] / [[Hoover Institution]] | work=Online Archive of California | access-date=December 16, 2019}}</ref> (re-broadcast on November 14, due to popular demand).
* "The Savage Heart: A Conversation with Eric Hoffer," with Eric Sevareid, CBS, January 28, 1969.<ref name="Eric Hoffer papers"/>

==Awards and recognition==
* 1971, May – Honorary Doctorate; Stonehill College
* 1971, June – Honorary Doctorate; Michigan Technological University
* 1978 – Bust of Eric Hoffer by sculptor Jonathan Hirschfeld; commissioned by Charles Kittrell and placed in Bartlesville, Oklahoma
* 1983, February 13 – [[Presidential Medal of Freedom]] awarded by [[Ronald Reagan]]
* 1985, September 17 – Skygate unveiling in San Francisco; dedication speech by [[Eric Sevareid]]

==See also==
* [[American philosophy]]
* [[List of American philosophers]]
* [[Ivan Ilyin]]
* [[Eric Voegelin]]<ref>''[https://books.google.com/books?id=OqgGo4knLjkC&dq=eric+hoffer+eric+voegelin&pg=PA71 The Fifties Spiritual Marketplace: American Religion in a Decade of Conflict]'' by Robert S. Ellwood Publisher: Rutgers University Press {{ISBN|978-0-8135-2346-0}}</ref>{{page needed|date=July 2021}}

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* ''American Iconoclast: The Life and Times of Eric Hoffer'', Shachtman, Tom, Titusville, NJ, Hopewell Publications, 2011. {{ISBN|978-1-933435-38-1}}.
* ''Hoffer's America'', Koerner, James D., La Salle, Ill., Library Press, 1973 {{ISBN|0-912050-45-4}}
* ''Eric Hoffer'', Baker, James Thomas. Boston : Twayne, 1982 {{ISBN|0-8057-7359-2}} Twayne's United States authors series
* ''Eric Hoffer: The Longshoreman Philosopher'', Bethell, Tom, Stanford, CA, Hoover Institution Press, 2012 {{ISBN|0-8179-1415-3}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote}}
* {{Find a Grave}}
* [http://www.hofferproject.org The Eric Hoffer Project], preserving the legacy of Eric Hoffer

{{Authority control}}

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[[Category:1902 births]]
[[Category:1983 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century American philosophers]]
[[Category:American atheists]]
[[Category:American social sciences writers]]
[[Category:American people of German descent]]
[[Category:People from the Bronx]]
[[Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients]]
[[Category:American social philosophers]]