Blomert cites the following aspects and passages/ Blomert zitiert folgende Aspekte (in order of the cited passages from the Heilbron-interview):

(Elias) besuchte ... ein Jaspers-Seminar, in welchem er auch ein Referat über 'Thomas Mann und die Zivilisationsliteraten' hielt (Heilbron-interview, p. 9; Blomert 1999, p. 232 & FN 28)

Mit der Husserl-Schule, in der Heidegger eine starke Position hatte, konnte er nichts anfangen: "Slight contempt for all of them" (Heilbron-interview, p. 9; Blomert 1999, p. 233 & FN 32)

Cassirer hatte in seinem 1910 erschienenen Buch ... einige Formulierungen benutzt, die an der Frage der Geltung zu rütteln schienen. Elias kannte das Buch und fühlte sich von seinen Gedanken angezogen: "With Cassirer things were different, that was no metaphysics. There were some links. He was also from Breslau and although I never met him, I knew quite closely one of his sons, who was also an philosopher. I had some affinity with his work. I had read 'Substanzbegriff and Funktionsbegriff' and some historical studies. But it was fundamentally centered on Hönigswald." (Heilbron-interview, p. 10; Blomert 1999, p. 229 & FN 16

Das Fach Soziologie war erst in der Mitte der zwanziger Jahre auf breite öffentliche Resonanz gestoßen. Elias berichtete: "During my first stay ... I had no connection with sociology whatsoever. When returned in 1925, sociology was fashionable in Heidelberg which it had not been during my first stay." (Heilbron-interview, p. 11; Blomert 1999, p. 239 & FN 53)

In Heidelberg jedoch war Mannheims Stellung noch die eines Privatdozenten und er war auf Elias angewiesen: "What a Privatdozent does is not a duty for students so it was important for him to have links with the students and I provided one of these links because I had easier relations with the students than he did." (Heilbron-interview, p. 22; Blomert 1999, p. 240 & FN 60)

source: Reinhard Blomert, Intellektuelle im Aufbruch, München 1999: Hanser