Karin Costelloe-Stephen’s Bergsonism and ‘The Facts’ of Time 1911–1922

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Karin Costelloe-Stephen worked at the crest of the ‘Bergson boom’. She placed herself at the centre of the controversy between Bertrand Russell and Henri Bergson, defending the Frenchman against Russell’s attacks. Making extensive use of unpublished archival letters, this chapter shows that Costelloe-Stephen ‘translated’ Bergsonian philosophy into Cambridge philosophy, with the aim of converting ‘Cambridge scoffers’ such as Russell. Her attempts at converting the scoffers failed, yet her subtle, fascinating ‘translation’ goes far beyond Bergson. As this chapter reads Costelloe-Stephen, she conceives Bergsonian intuition about time to be a form of Russellian acquaintance. Further, unlike Bergson and her fellow Bergsonians, she argues that the contents of a present experience are simultaneous and non-relational. This is a claim that Russell would ultimately take as a target: having read Costelloe-Stephen's work, Russell went on to argue that the contents of a present experience need not be simultaneous and are relational.</jats:p>