Heinrich Blücher had survived a cerebral aneurysm in 1961 and remained unwell after 1963, sustaining a series of heart attacks. On 31 October 1970 he died of a massive heart attack. A devastated Arendt had previously told Mary McCarthy, "Life without him would be unthinkable".[208] Arendt was also a heavy smoker and was frequently depicted with a cigarette in her hand. She sustained a near fatal heart attack while lecturing in Scotland in May 1974, and although she recovered, she remained in poor health afterwards, and continued to smoke.[209] On the evening of 4 December 1975, shortly after her 69th birthday, she had a further heart attack in her apartment while entertaining friends, and was pronounced dead at the scene.[210][211] Her ashes were buried alongside those of Blücher at Bard College, in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York in May 1976.[179][212]
After Arendt's death the title page of the final part of The Life of the Mind ("Judging") was found in her typewriter, which she had just started, consisting of the title and two epigraphs. This has subsequently been reproduced in the edited version of her Lectures on Kant's Political Philosophy.(see image).[213]
