The annual Hettner-Lecture series is devoted to new theoretical developments in the crossover fields of geography, economics, the social sciences, and the humanities. David N. Livingstone presented during the fifth Hettner-Lecture two lectures entitled 'Knowledge, space and the geographies of science' and 'Tropical hermeneutics and the climatic imagination', both of which are published in this volume in revised form. In the interview with Michael Hoyler, Tim Freytag and Heike Jöns, David N. Livingstone talks about geographical traditions and his development as a geographer and his research interests.