Hans-Georg Gadamer lived the full length of the 21st century. His major work— Truth and Method—was not published until he was sixty years old, by which time he had survived two world wars. This chapter moves from his childhood and youth, through his early years as a struggling academic and scholar, his middle years in and immediately after WWII, and his later flourishing following the publication of Truth and class="EmphasisTypeItalic ">Method . The emphasis throughout this chapter is on the relation of the life to the work—and both the life and the work to the broader context of 20th century European history. Gadamer emerged from the maelstrom of the 20th century not only as an original thinker, but as a great teacher who reached across cultural and ideological divides in an attempt to build shared understanding. His life provides us with an exemplar of what it is to be—and become—a great teacher.