Stirner's The Ego and its Own (1845) is striking in both style and content, attacking Feuerbach, Moses Hess and others to sound the death-knell of Left Hegelianism. The work also constitutes an enduring critique of liberalism and socialism from the perspective of an extreme eccentric individualism. Stirner has latterly been portrayed variously as a precursor of Nietzsche, a forerunner of existentialism, an individualist anarchist, and as manifestly insane. This edition includes an Introduction placing Stirner in his historical context.