The below is a slapdash review I put together immediately after finishing “The Need for Roots”. Mysticism plus French exceptionalism plus spiritual socialism plus the battle between good and evil. It has it all.

Another in the wide canon of 20th Century works trying to diagnose and resolve that which ails modern society – with a French socialist mystical twist! When the world was at its most ideologically split, Simone Weil chose to blend whatever seemed correct to her. The end result is this book; an exercise in trying to identify ways humanity (read: France) can have its luster restored after the total collapse of 1940.

Lot of interesting ideas in here, especially on the difference between mutual obligation and individual rights (she approves of the former as channeling an organic morality, thinks the latter is destructive and alien in many ways). The portions on recapturing the “genius” of France and France’s mission in the world made me laugh whenever she followed those exaltations by taking a swipe at America. Her dislike of a nation without many historical roots that also enshrines personal rights as its raison d’être makes sense, but there are no societies quicker to proclaim a sacred national mission than France and the US. In that, we’re more alike than any two groups on the planet.

Modern scientists piss her off because of a (perceived) tendency to rush forth to discover things simply so they can get credit for it without considering any destructive implications of their work. That race is not a search for truth. Her thoughts on the sovereignty we give machines and technology, and how we thus might as well be digging our own graves, resonates clearly 80 years on. To Weil, only spirituality can lead to real truths.

Her solution? Hard as sin manual labor. The day in, day out action that is most akin to death. Center physical work at the core of your society and allow that ethos to drive the rest of the spiritual cogs in the right direction. That’s one hell of a closing argument after the wild ride that preceded it.