Robert C. Solomon
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195181579
- eISBN:
- 9780199786602
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195181573.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre were the giants of 20th-century “existentialism”, although neither of them was comfortable with that title. Their famous differences aside, they shared a ...
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Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre were the giants of 20th-century “existentialism”, although neither of them was comfortable with that title. Their famous differences aside, they shared a “phenomenological” sensibility and described personal experience in exquisite and excruciating detail and reflected on the meaning of this experience with both sensitivity and insight. That is the focus of this book: Camus and Sartre, their descriptions of personal experience, and their reflections on the meaning of this experience. They also reflected, worriedly, on the nature of reflection. The thematic problem of the book is the relationship between experience and reflection. The book explores this relationship through novels and plays, Camus’ The Stranger, The Plague, and The Fall, Sartre’s Nausea and No Exit, and Sartre’s great philosophical tome, Being and Nothingness.Less
Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre were the giants of 20th-century “existentialism”, although neither of them was comfortable with that title. Their famous differences aside, they shared a “phenomenological” sensibility and described personal experience in exquisite and excruciating detail and reflected on the meaning of this experience with both sensitivity and insight. That is the focus of this book: Camus and Sartre, their descriptions of personal experience, and their reflections on the meaning of this experience. They also reflected, worriedly, on the nature of reflection. The thematic problem of the book is the relationship between experience and reflection. The book explores this relationship through novels and plays, Camus’ The Stranger, The Plague, and The Fall, Sartre’s Nausea and No Exit, and Sartre’s great philosophical tome, Being and Nothingness.
William F. Bristow
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- May 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199290642
- eISBN:
- 9780191710421
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199290642.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
This book presents a study of Hegel's hugely influential but notoriously difficult Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel describes the method of this work as a ‘way of despair’, meaning that the reader who ...
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This book presents a study of Hegel's hugely influential but notoriously difficult Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel describes the method of this work as a ‘way of despair’, meaning that the reader who undertakes its inquiry must be open to the experience of self-loss through it. Whereas the existential dimension of Hegel's work has often been either ignored or regarded as romantic ornamentation, this book argues that it belongs centrally to Hegel's attempt to fulfil a demanding epistemological ambition. With his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant expressed a new epistemological demand with respect to rational knowledge and presented a new method for meeting this demand. This book reconstructs Hegel's objection to Kant's Critical Philosophy, according to which Kant's way of meeting the epistemological demand of philosophical critique presupposes subjectivism, that is, presupposes the restriction of our knowledge to things as they are merely for us. Whereas Hegel in his early Jena writings rejects Kant's critical project altogether on this basis, he comes to see that the epistemological demand expressed in Kant's project must be met. This book argues that Hegel's method in the Phenomenology of Spirit takes shape as his attempt to meet the epistemological demand of Kantian critique without presupposing subjectivism. The key to Hegel's transformation of Kant's critical procedure, by virtue of which subjectivism is to be avoided, is precisely the existential or self-transformational dimension of Hegel's criticism, the openness of the criticizing subject to being transformed through the epistemological procedure.Less
This book presents a study of Hegel's hugely influential but notoriously difficult Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel describes the method of this work as a ‘way of despair’, meaning that the reader who undertakes its inquiry must be open to the experience of self-loss through it. Whereas the existential dimension of Hegel's work has often been either ignored or regarded as romantic ornamentation, this book argues that it belongs centrally to Hegel's attempt to fulfil a demanding epistemological ambition. With his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant expressed a new epistemological demand with respect to rational knowledge and presented a new method for meeting this demand. This book reconstructs Hegel's objection to Kant's Critical Philosophy, according to which Kant's way of meeting the epistemological demand of philosophical critique presupposes subjectivism, that is, presupposes the restriction of our knowledge to things as they are merely for us. Whereas Hegel in his early Jena writings rejects Kant's critical project altogether on this basis, he comes to see that the epistemological demand expressed in Kant's project must be met. This book argues that Hegel's method in the Phenomenology of Spirit takes shape as his attempt to meet the epistemological demand of Kantian critique without presupposing subjectivism. The key to Hegel's transformation of Kant's critical procedure, by virtue of which subjectivism is to be avoided, is precisely the existential or self-transformational dimension of Hegel's criticism, the openness of the criticizing subject to being transformed through the epistemological procedure.
Alvin Plantinga
Matthew Davidson (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780195103762
- eISBN:
- 9780199833573
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195103769.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Metaphysics/Epistemology
This book is a collection of my essays, dating from 1969, concerning the metaphysics of modality. The first two chapters are a defense of the idea of modality de re against criticisms from William ...
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This book is a collection of my essays, dating from 1969, concerning the metaphysics of modality. The first two chapters are a defense of the idea of modality de re against criticisms from William Kneale and W. V. Quine, and an elaboration on the notions of possible worlds and essences. In the third chapter, I conclude that the Theory of Worldbound Individuals is false, even when fortified with Counterpart Theory. Chapter 4 contains an argument for the conclusion that there neither are, nor could have been, possible but nonexistent objects. In the next chapter, I develop this theme in greater detail and argue for the compatibility of actualism – i.e., the view that there neither are, nor could have been, any nonexistent objects – and possible worlds. Both Chs. 6 and 7 contain an account of the relationship between proper names and essences, my view being that proper names express essences and that sometimes different proper names for the same object express different essences of that object. The end of Ch. 7 and all of Ch. 8 are an examination of existentialism (the theory that propositions and states of affairs ontologically depend on their subjects) and arguments against it. In Ch. 9, I defend my theory of modality against objections raised by John Pollock. In Ch. 10, I sketch out what the commitments of modal realism are, and argue that David Lewis's modal theory is not a modal realist theory. Finally, in the concluding chapter I argue that propositions cannot be concrete objects.Less
This book is a collection of my essays, dating from 1969, concerning the metaphysics of modality. The first two chapters are a defense of the idea of modality de re against criticisms from William Kneale and W. V. Quine, and an elaboration on the notions of possible worlds and essences. In the third chapter, I conclude that the Theory of Worldbound Individuals is false, even when fortified with Counterpart Theory. Chapter 4 contains an argument for the conclusion that there neither are, nor could have been, possible but nonexistent objects. In the next chapter, I develop this theme in greater detail and argue for the compatibility of actualism – i.e., the view that there neither are, nor could have been, any nonexistent objects – and possible worlds. Both Chs. 6 and 7 contain an account of the relationship between proper names and essences, my view being that proper names express essences and that sometimes different proper names for the same object express different essences of that object. The end of Ch. 7 and all of Ch. 8 are an examination of existentialism (the theory that propositions and states of affairs ontologically depend on their subjects) and arguments against it. In Ch. 9, I defend my theory of modality against objections raised by John Pollock. In Ch. 10, I sketch out what the commitments of modal realism are, and argue that David Lewis's modal theory is not a modal realist theory. Finally, in the concluding chapter I argue that propositions cannot be concrete objects.
John Richardson
- Published in print:
- 1991
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198239222
- eISBN:
- 9780191598319
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019823922X.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
I develop a Heideggerian response to the central traditional problem in epistemology—whether we can have (objective) knowledge of the external world. I introduce the main philosophical terms and ...
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I develop a Heideggerian response to the central traditional problem in epistemology—whether we can have (objective) knowledge of the external world. I introduce the main philosophical terms and claims of Being and Time, and try to use this system to amplify the book's brief and elusive treatments of that problem. Because Heidegger's early system is crucially ‘existential’, it gives a critique of epistemology from an existential stance—or an existential epistemology. This critique claims to ‘dissolve’ or ‘undermine’ that traditional problem, by showing how it is misguided or misformed. Heidegger's ultimate argument is that the problem rests on a mistake about time, or about the temporal character of reality, and of humans—Dasein—in particular. Heidegger thinks this mistake infects not just epistemology, but our whole theoretical stance, how we try to go beyond our ‘everyday’, pre‐theoretical understanding. But his point is not to return us to that ‘everydayness’, but to improve our thinking by turning it into a ‘phenomenology’, which—by Heidegger's existential twist—amounts to the same thing as authenticity. My three chapters focus respectively on these three basic stances—everydayness, epistemology, and phenomenology.Less
I develop a Heideggerian response to the central traditional problem in epistemology—whether we can have (objective) knowledge of the external world. I introduce the main philosophical terms and claims of Being and Time, and try to use this system to amplify the book's brief and elusive treatments of that problem. Because Heidegger's early system is crucially ‘existential’, it gives a critique of epistemology from an existential stance—or an existential epistemology. This critique claims to ‘dissolve’ or ‘undermine’ that traditional problem, by showing how it is misguided or misformed. Heidegger's ultimate argument is that the problem rests on a mistake about time, or about the temporal character of reality, and of humans—Dasein—in particular. Heidegger thinks this mistake infects not just epistemology, but our whole theoretical stance, how we try to go beyond our ‘everyday’, pre‐theoretical understanding. But his point is not to return us to that ‘everydayness’, but to improve our thinking by turning it into a ‘phenomenology’, which—by Heidegger's existential twist—amounts to the same thing as authenticity. My three chapters focus respectively on these three basic stances—everydayness, epistemology, and phenomenology.
Ernest Nicholson (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197263051
- eISBN:
- 9780191734090
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197263051.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religious Studies
The chapters in this book give an account of how the agenda for theology and religious studies was set and reset throughout the twentieth century – by rapid and at times cataclysmic changes (wars, ...
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The chapters in this book give an account of how the agenda for theology and religious studies was set and reset throughout the twentieth century – by rapid and at times cataclysmic changes (wars, followed by social and academic upheavals in the 1960s), by new movements of thought, by a bounty of archaeological discoveries, and by unprecedented archival research. Further new trends of study and fresh approaches (existentialist, Marxian, postmodern) have in more recent years generated new quests and horizons for reflection and research. Theological enquiry in Great Britain was transformed in the late nineteenth century through the gradual acceptance of the methods and results of historical criticism. New agendas emerged in the various sub-disciplines of theology and religious studies. Some of the issues raised by biblical criticism, for example Christology and the ‘quest of the historical Jesus’, were to remain topics of controversy throughout the twentieth century. In other important and far-reaching ways, however, the agendas that seemed clear in the early part of the century were abandoned, or transformed and replaced, not only as a result of new discoveries and movements of thought, but also by the unfolding events of a century that brought the appalling carnage and horror of two world wars. Their aftermath brought a shattering of inherited world views, including religious world views, and disillusion with the optimistic trust in inevitable progress that had seemed assured in many quarters and found expression in widely influential ‘liberal’ theological thought of the time. The centenary of the British Academy in 2002 has provided a most welcome opportunity for reconsidering the contribution of British scholarship to theological and religious studies in the last hundred years.Less
The chapters in this book give an account of how the agenda for theology and religious studies was set and reset throughout the twentieth century – by rapid and at times cataclysmic changes (wars, followed by social and academic upheavals in the 1960s), by new movements of thought, by a bounty of archaeological discoveries, and by unprecedented archival research. Further new trends of study and fresh approaches (existentialist, Marxian, postmodern) have in more recent years generated new quests and horizons for reflection and research. Theological enquiry in Great Britain was transformed in the late nineteenth century through the gradual acceptance of the methods and results of historical criticism. New agendas emerged in the various sub-disciplines of theology and religious studies. Some of the issues raised by biblical criticism, for example Christology and the ‘quest of the historical Jesus’, were to remain topics of controversy throughout the twentieth century. In other important and far-reaching ways, however, the agendas that seemed clear in the early part of the century were abandoned, or transformed and replaced, not only as a result of new discoveries and movements of thought, but also by the unfolding events of a century that brought the appalling carnage and horror of two world wars. Their aftermath brought a shattering of inherited world views, including religious world views, and disillusion with the optimistic trust in inevitable progress that had seemed assured in many quarters and found expression in widely influential ‘liberal’ theological thought of the time. The centenary of the British Academy in 2002 has provided a most welcome opportunity for reconsidering the contribution of British scholarship to theological and religious studies in the last hundred years.
Bernard Schweizer
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- January 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199751389
- eISBN:
- 9780199894864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199751389.003.0005
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
The trajectory of Elie Wiesel’s evolving religious views is the inverse of Rebecca West’s. While West started and ended her life as a misotheist, experiencing a more conventional phase of piety in ...
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The trajectory of Elie Wiesel’s evolving religious views is the inverse of Rebecca West’s. While West started and ended her life as a misotheist, experiencing a more conventional phase of piety in mid-life, Wiesel was a misotheist only during the middle part of his life. Starting out a devout Hasidic Jew, he lost his affirmative faith during the Holocaust. In his memoir, Night, he dramatized the protest against God in searing words: “I was the accuser, God the accused.” His accusations against God then moved into his novels, which are informed by an existentialist conception of a careless God. Wiesel’s case against God is most clearly stated in The Trial of God: “God is merciless…. He will not prevent me from letting my anger explode.” Wiesel eventually retreated from such radical positions and began to argue instead that God deserves man’s pity not his anger.Less
The trajectory of Elie Wiesel’s evolving religious views is the inverse of Rebecca West’s. While West started and ended her life as a misotheist, experiencing a more conventional phase of piety in mid-life, Wiesel was a misotheist only during the middle part of his life. Starting out a devout Hasidic Jew, he lost his affirmative faith during the Holocaust. In his memoir, Night, he dramatized the protest against God in searing words: “I was the accuser, God the accused.” His accusations against God then moved into his novels, which are informed by an existentialist conception of a careless God. Wiesel’s case against God is most clearly stated in The Trial of God: “God is merciless…. He will not prevent me from letting my anger explode.” Wiesel eventually retreated from such radical positions and began to argue instead that God deserves man’s pity not his anger.
Rivkah Zim
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691161808
- eISBN:
- 9781400852093
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691161808.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter considers the writings of Thomas More and Antonio Gramsci. It demonstrates some of the similarities in the political and intellectual methods that generated their prison writing and ...
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This chapter considers the writings of Thomas More and Antonio Gramsci. It demonstrates some of the similarities in the political and intellectual methods that generated their prison writing and helped to create their posthumous reputations. These conceptual changes were partly owing to a shared heritage of classical learning that conditioned how their thought processes are reflected in their forms of expression. The mental habits of both polemicists were formed by their literary training in dialectic: they each made creative use of contrast rather than comparison or similitude. In prison these tendencies were exacerbated, as different forms of dialogue and dialectic enabled each writer to reassess the ideas for which he was being persecuted and to sustain his resolve and humanity in family relationships. More's and Gramsci's prison writings therefore engage with existential themes and the politics of authority, yet at the same time they reflect the warmth and importance of family relationships in the dialogic forms of personal correspondence. Their prison writings have been crucial to the political impact of their lives.Less
This chapter considers the writings of Thomas More and Antonio Gramsci. It demonstrates some of the similarities in the political and intellectual methods that generated their prison writing and helped to create their posthumous reputations. These conceptual changes were partly owing to a shared heritage of classical learning that conditioned how their thought processes are reflected in their forms of expression. The mental habits of both polemicists were formed by their literary training in dialectic: they each made creative use of contrast rather than comparison or similitude. In prison these tendencies were exacerbated, as different forms of dialogue and dialectic enabled each writer to reassess the ideas for which he was being persecuted and to sustain his resolve and humanity in family relationships. More's and Gramsci's prison writings therefore engage with existential themes and the politics of authority, yet at the same time they reflect the warmth and importance of family relationships in the dialogic forms of personal correspondence. Their prison writings have been crucial to the political impact of their lives.
Michael Sheringham
- Published in print:
- 1993
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158431
- eISBN:
- 9780191673306
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158431.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
Sartrean existentialism has radical implications on how to conduct life and what life really is. Parisian existentialism offers the same ideology but from a different position. This chapter provides ...
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Sartrean existentialism has radical implications on how to conduct life and what life really is. Parisian existentialism offers the same ideology but from a different position. This chapter provides an extended study on autobiography and ideology. It studies texts written under Sartrean existentialism. The works of Genet, Leduc, Beauvoir, Gorz, and Sarte are presented here.Less
Sartrean existentialism has radical implications on how to conduct life and what life really is. Parisian existentialism offers the same ideology but from a different position. This chapter provides an extended study on autobiography and ideology. It studies texts written under Sartrean existentialism. The works of Genet, Leduc, Beauvoir, Gorz, and Sarte are presented here.
Sophie Ratcliffe
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199239870
- eISBN:
- 9780191716799
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199239870.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, Poetry
This chapter considers Auden's longer poems, especially The Sea and the Mirror, with reference to his ideas about sympathy and theological belief. It demonstrates how Auden's concerns about Freudian ...
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This chapter considers Auden's longer poems, especially The Sea and the Mirror, with reference to his ideas about sympathy and theological belief. It demonstrates how Auden's concerns about Freudian developmental theories of emotion and sympathy affected his formal choices, particularly his use of allusion and rhyme. Formerly unnoticed allusions to Henry James's writing in Auden's poetry are explored. Chapter 3 counters post-structuralist readings of later Auden demonstrating that this repeated use of allusion has a theological intent.Less
This chapter considers Auden's longer poems, especially The Sea and the Mirror, with reference to his ideas about sympathy and theological belief. It demonstrates how Auden's concerns about Freudian developmental theories of emotion and sympathy affected his formal choices, particularly his use of allusion and rhyme. Formerly unnoticed allusions to Henry James's writing in Auden's poetry are explored. Chapter 3 counters post-structuralist readings of later Auden demonstrating that this repeated use of allusion has a theological intent.
Cairns Craig
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781474447201
- eISBN:
- 9781474464987
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474447201.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Women's Literature
Muriel Spark, Existentialism and the Art of Death traces Muriel Spark’s indebtedness to the tradition of Christian existentialism that derives from nineteenth century Danish philosopher Søren ...
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Muriel Spark, Existentialism and the Art of Death traces Muriel Spark’s indebtedness to the tradition of Christian existentialism that derives from nineteenth century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard. Christian existentialism was well-established before Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir developed its influential atheistic version in the 1940s, and the book explores the ways in which Spark, in her novels and short stories, develops Kierkegaardian themes and techniques in celebration of the ‘leap to faith’. It also shows how Spark builds on Kierkegaard’s conception of the ‘aesthetic’ as the condition of secular, sensual existence, and the paradoxical condition of art, which cannot, in itself, escape the aesthetic but must point to its own entrapment within values that its author rejects. Kierkegaard’s ironic adoption of pseudonymous surrogate authors for many of his books is similar to the ways in which Spark endows her central characters with powers normally reserved to the author/narrator of a story. The book provides detailed analysis of these issues in many of Spark’s major novels in order to show her engagement with, and her rejection of, atheistic existentialism, and her insistence that art can only provide the consolation of a pseudo-eternity which distracts from the recognition of Christianity’s true eternity. In this sense, hers is an art of death – of her characters’ efforts to control death, and of the novel’s formal evasion of it.Less
Muriel Spark, Existentialism and the Art of Death traces Muriel Spark’s indebtedness to the tradition of Christian existentialism that derives from nineteenth century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard. Christian existentialism was well-established before Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir developed its influential atheistic version in the 1940s, and the book explores the ways in which Spark, in her novels and short stories, develops Kierkegaardian themes and techniques in celebration of the ‘leap to faith’. It also shows how Spark builds on Kierkegaard’s conception of the ‘aesthetic’ as the condition of secular, sensual existence, and the paradoxical condition of art, which cannot, in itself, escape the aesthetic but must point to its own entrapment within values that its author rejects. Kierkegaard’s ironic adoption of pseudonymous surrogate authors for many of his books is similar to the ways in which Spark endows her central characters with powers normally reserved to the author/narrator of a story. The book provides detailed analysis of these issues in many of Spark’s major novels in order to show her engagement with, and her rejection of, atheistic existentialism, and her insistence that art can only provide the consolation of a pseudo-eternity which distracts from the recognition of Christianity’s true eternity. In this sense, hers is an art of death – of her characters’ efforts to control death, and of the novel’s formal evasion of it.
William Taussig Scott and Martin X. Moleski
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- July 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195174335
- eISBN:
- 9780199835706
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019517433X.003.0010
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
Because Polanyi found a great deal of support for his work through philosophers and theologians in the United States, he traveled there frequently and gave dozens of lectures that helped him to ...
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Because Polanyi found a great deal of support for his work through philosophers and theologians in the United States, he traveled there frequently and gave dozens of lectures that helped him to distill his understanding of the tacit dimensions of thought. By dwelling in interpretative frameworks, we make new discoveries that allow us to break out of the old worldview, casting all of the data in an entirely new light. Polanyi also found a deep harmony between the epistemology of personal knowledge and existentialism, because knowing is a free act for which the knower must take personal responsibility.Less
Because Polanyi found a great deal of support for his work through philosophers and theologians in the United States, he traveled there frequently and gave dozens of lectures that helped him to distill his understanding of the tacit dimensions of thought. By dwelling in interpretative frameworks, we make new discoveries that allow us to break out of the old worldview, casting all of the data in an entirely new light. Polanyi also found a deep harmony between the epistemology of personal knowledge and existentialism, because knowing is a free act for which the knower must take personal responsibility.
Mariam Thalos
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199855469
- eISBN:
- 9780199932788
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199855469.003.0018
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Feminist Philosophy
Social relations are the core of a human self. Affiliations shape our social world, and ultimately alliances are the large players on the stage of human history. In the process of forging social ...
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Social relations are the core of a human self. Affiliations shape our social world, and ultimately alliances are the large players on the stage of human history. In the process of forging social links, human beings are sometimes lucky enough to enjoy the exercise of genuine existential freedom. These axioms are at the heart of the feminist account of self and social identity presented in this essay.Less
Social relations are the core of a human self. Affiliations shape our social world, and ultimately alliances are the large players on the stage of human history. In the process of forging social links, human beings are sometimes lucky enough to enjoy the exercise of genuine existential freedom. These axioms are at the heart of the feminist account of self and social identity presented in this essay.
Steven Earnshaw
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780719099618
- eISBN:
- 9781526141934
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719099618.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Drinking to excess has been a striking problem for industrial and post-industrial societies – who is responsible when a ‘free’ individual opts for a slow suicide? The causes of such drinking have ...
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Drinking to excess has been a striking problem for industrial and post-industrial societies – who is responsible when a ‘free’ individual opts for a slow suicide? The causes of such drinking have often been blamed on heredity, moral weakness, ‘disease’ (addiction), hedonism, and Romantic illusion. Yet there is another reason which may be more fundamental and which has been overlooked or dismissed, and it is that the drinker may act with sincere philosophical intent. The Existential drinker looks at the convergence of a new kind of excessive, habitual drinking, beginning in the nineteenth century, and a new way of thinking about the self which in the twentieth century comes to be labelled ‘Existential’. A substantial introduction covers questions of self, will, consciousness, authenticity and ethics in relation to drinking, while introducing aspects of Existential thought pertinent to the discussion. The Existential-drinker canon is anchored in Jack London’s ‘alcoholic memoir’ John Barleycorn (1913) where London claims he can get at the truth of existence only through the insights afforded by excessive and repeated alcohol use. The book then covers drinker-texts such as Jean Rhys’s interwar novels, Malcolm Lowry’s Under the volcano, Charles Jackson’s The lost weekend and John O’Brien’s Leaving Las Vegas, along with less well-known works such as Frederick Exley’s A fan’s notes, Venedikt Yerofeev’s Moscow-Petushki, and A. L. Kennedy’s Paradise. The book will appeal to anybody with an interest in drinking and literature, as well as those with more specialised concerns in drinking studies, Existentialism, twentieth-century literature, and medical humanities.Less
Drinking to excess has been a striking problem for industrial and post-industrial societies – who is responsible when a ‘free’ individual opts for a slow suicide? The causes of such drinking have often been blamed on heredity, moral weakness, ‘disease’ (addiction), hedonism, and Romantic illusion. Yet there is another reason which may be more fundamental and which has been overlooked or dismissed, and it is that the drinker may act with sincere philosophical intent. The Existential drinker looks at the convergence of a new kind of excessive, habitual drinking, beginning in the nineteenth century, and a new way of thinking about the self which in the twentieth century comes to be labelled ‘Existential’. A substantial introduction covers questions of self, will, consciousness, authenticity and ethics in relation to drinking, while introducing aspects of Existential thought pertinent to the discussion. The Existential-drinker canon is anchored in Jack London’s ‘alcoholic memoir’ John Barleycorn (1913) where London claims he can get at the truth of existence only through the insights afforded by excessive and repeated alcohol use. The book then covers drinker-texts such as Jean Rhys’s interwar novels, Malcolm Lowry’s Under the volcano, Charles Jackson’s The lost weekend and John O’Brien’s Leaving Las Vegas, along with less well-known works such as Frederick Exley’s A fan’s notes, Venedikt Yerofeev’s Moscow-Petushki, and A. L. Kennedy’s Paradise. The book will appeal to anybody with an interest in drinking and literature, as well as those with more specialised concerns in drinking studies, Existentialism, twentieth-century literature, and medical humanities.
Yoav Di-Capua
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780226499741
- eISBN:
- 9780226499888
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226499888.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Ideas
It is a curious and little-known fact that the largest existentialist scene outside of Europe was in the Middle East. For two long decades, from the end of World War II until the late 1960s, ...
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It is a curious and little-known fact that the largest existentialist scene outside of Europe was in the Middle East. For two long decades, from the end of World War II until the late 1960s, Jean-Paul Sartre was the uncontested champion of the Arab intelligentsia. Sartre’s existentialist philosophy nourished the post-colonial Arab quest for a new Arab subjectivity, or, as they called it, a “New Arab Man.” Sartre’s political writing manifested itself in unflinching support for the cause of Third Worldism, thus framing the liberationist struggle against neo-colonialism, imperialism and Zionism. His influence on Arab thought and action and his two-way relationship with an important circle of Arab thinkers was therefore very significant. By closely following the remarkable career of Arab existentialism, No Exit reconstructs the forgotten global milieu of the post-colonial Arab generation. Drawing extensively on new Arabic and Hebrew archival sources, No Exit examines the multiple cultural functions of Arab existentialism and, especially, the rise and fall of the relationship between Jean Paul Sartre and Arab intellectuals due to Sartre’s decision to side with Israel on the eve of the 1967 war.Less
It is a curious and little-known fact that the largest existentialist scene outside of Europe was in the Middle East. For two long decades, from the end of World War II until the late 1960s, Jean-Paul Sartre was the uncontested champion of the Arab intelligentsia. Sartre’s existentialist philosophy nourished the post-colonial Arab quest for a new Arab subjectivity, or, as they called it, a “New Arab Man.” Sartre’s political writing manifested itself in unflinching support for the cause of Third Worldism, thus framing the liberationist struggle against neo-colonialism, imperialism and Zionism. His influence on Arab thought and action and his two-way relationship with an important circle of Arab thinkers was therefore very significant. By closely following the remarkable career of Arab existentialism, No Exit reconstructs the forgotten global milieu of the post-colonial Arab generation. Drawing extensively on new Arabic and Hebrew archival sources, No Exit examines the multiple cultural functions of Arab existentialism and, especially, the rise and fall of the relationship between Jean Paul Sartre and Arab intellectuals due to Sartre’s decision to side with Israel on the eve of the 1967 war.
Rocco Rubini
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780226186139
- eISBN:
- 9780226186276
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226186276.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
This book provides an overdue cultural translation of modern Italian intellectual and philosophical history, a development bookended by Giambattista Vico and Antonio Gramsci. It shows Italian ...
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This book provides an overdue cultural translation of modern Italian intellectual and philosophical history, a development bookended by Giambattista Vico and Antonio Gramsci. It shows Italian philosophy to have emerged during the age of the Risorgimento in reaction to eighteenth-century French revolutionary and rationalist standards in politics and philosophy and in critical assimilation of the German reaction to the same, mainly Hegelian idealism and, eventually, Heideggerian existentialism. Specifically, this is the story of modern Italian philosophy told through the lens of Renaissance scholarship. It introduces Anglo-American readers to Italian philosophy as it reflected a Renaissance precedent it wished to enliven, reactivate, and improve in support or criticism of nineteenth- and twentieth-century upheavals: unity (Risorgimento), empire (Fascism), and democracy (Republicanism). This Renaissance or humanist focus clarifies the Italian philosophical “difference” vis-à-vis the main strands of Continental philosophy (French, German, and their American elaborations), a “difference” that, perhaps to our advantage today, sheltered Italian inquiry from the self-confuting framework of the postmodern moment. By identifying the presence of Renaissance humanism in modern philosophical thought and in the scholarship of Bertrando Spaventa, Giovanni Gentile, Ernesto Grassi, Eugenio Garin, and Paul Oskar Kristeller, among others, The Italians' Renaissance recovers a tradition in Renaissance studies that runs parallel to, and separately from, the one initiated by Jacob Burckhardt's The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860). In so doing it calls for a renewed dialogue between students of philosophy and of the Renaissance, a dialogue that would prevent the study of the origins of modernity from turning into a form of antiquarianism.Less
This book provides an overdue cultural translation of modern Italian intellectual and philosophical history, a development bookended by Giambattista Vico and Antonio Gramsci. It shows Italian philosophy to have emerged during the age of the Risorgimento in reaction to eighteenth-century French revolutionary and rationalist standards in politics and philosophy and in critical assimilation of the German reaction to the same, mainly Hegelian idealism and, eventually, Heideggerian existentialism. Specifically, this is the story of modern Italian philosophy told through the lens of Renaissance scholarship. It introduces Anglo-American readers to Italian philosophy as it reflected a Renaissance precedent it wished to enliven, reactivate, and improve in support or criticism of nineteenth- and twentieth-century upheavals: unity (Risorgimento), empire (Fascism), and democracy (Republicanism). This Renaissance or humanist focus clarifies the Italian philosophical “difference” vis-à-vis the main strands of Continental philosophy (French, German, and their American elaborations), a “difference” that, perhaps to our advantage today, sheltered Italian inquiry from the self-confuting framework of the postmodern moment. By identifying the presence of Renaissance humanism in modern philosophical thought and in the scholarship of Bertrando Spaventa, Giovanni Gentile, Ernesto Grassi, Eugenio Garin, and Paul Oskar Kristeller, among others, The Italians' Renaissance recovers a tradition in Renaissance studies that runs parallel to, and separately from, the one initiated by Jacob Burckhardt's The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (1860). In so doing it calls for a renewed dialogue between students of philosophy and of the Renaissance, a dialogue that would prevent the study of the origins of modernity from turning into a form of antiquarianism.
Elizabeth Boa
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158196
- eISBN:
- 9780191673283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158196.003.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
Much has been discussed of Franz Kafka; his unorthodox narrative style and his depiction of surreal and foreboding situations, which have enchanted the existentialist reader throughout history. ...
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Much has been discussed of Franz Kafka; his unorthodox narrative style and his depiction of surreal and foreboding situations, which have enchanted the existentialist reader throughout history. Despite the countless literary and psychological analyses dedicated to his work, the matter of perception is largely static. Most analysis of his works has been dedicated to understanding the protagonist. This chapter, however, states that the analysis should be towards the reader themself, as perception is as important as understanding the social struggles and inner conflicts the protagonist has with himself and the society around them. It summarizes the topics in the succeeding chapters; namely Kafka's literary masterpieces and their relationship to topics such as existentialism, feminism, and the underlying erotic tones that dominated the literary sphere during his time.Less
Much has been discussed of Franz Kafka; his unorthodox narrative style and his depiction of surreal and foreboding situations, which have enchanted the existentialist reader throughout history. Despite the countless literary and psychological analyses dedicated to his work, the matter of perception is largely static. Most analysis of his works has been dedicated to understanding the protagonist. This chapter, however, states that the analysis should be towards the reader themself, as perception is as important as understanding the social struggles and inner conflicts the protagonist has with himself and the society around them. It summarizes the topics in the succeeding chapters; namely Kafka's literary masterpieces and their relationship to topics such as existentialism, feminism, and the underlying erotic tones that dominated the literary sphere during his time.
Elizabeth Boa
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158196
- eISBN:
- 9780191673283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158196.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
This chapter provides an in-depth background to the style of Kafka's writing, stating that the turmoil-filled state of society in which he lived gave rise to many of the surreal social and cultural ...
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This chapter provides an in-depth background to the style of Kafka's writing, stating that the turmoil-filled state of society in which he lived gave rise to many of the surreal social and cultural portrayals present in his work. The main catalyst for Kafka's work is his identity, or rather, the identity of his kind as a minority in a society which places too much importance on race, gender, and sexuality. In a society where much praise goes the quality of bloodline, Kafka found himself estranged from himself, his family, and the world around him. As a German-speaking person born to a well-off Jewish family, he was seen as not on a par with his pureblooded contemporaries, a crisis he shared with most of his kind during those days. He was, in essence, the basis of the reoccurring bachelor archetype present in many of his famous works; an entity in a world where to be emancipated is to be feral and inhuman, and in which social isolation only breeds a struggled attempt to placate an erotic longing, with writing the only medium for escape.Less
This chapter provides an in-depth background to the style of Kafka's writing, stating that the turmoil-filled state of society in which he lived gave rise to many of the surreal social and cultural portrayals present in his work. The main catalyst for Kafka's work is his identity, or rather, the identity of his kind as a minority in a society which places too much importance on race, gender, and sexuality. In a society where much praise goes the quality of bloodline, Kafka found himself estranged from himself, his family, and the world around him. As a German-speaking person born to a well-off Jewish family, he was seen as not on a par with his pureblooded contemporaries, a crisis he shared with most of his kind during those days. He was, in essence, the basis of the reoccurring bachelor archetype present in many of his famous works; an entity in a world where to be emancipated is to be feral and inhuman, and in which social isolation only breeds a struggled attempt to placate an erotic longing, with writing the only medium for escape.
Elizabeth Boa
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158196
- eISBN:
- 9780191673283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158196.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
This chapter sheds light on the symbolic and almost surreal conflicts present in many of Kafka's celebrated works. It not only looks at his famous novels such as The Metamorphosis, but also his short ...
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This chapter sheds light on the symbolic and almost surreal conflicts present in many of Kafka's celebrated works. It not only looks at his famous novels such as The Metamorphosis, but also his short stories, such as A Country Doctor and Josephine the Singer. Kafka's short stories typically depicted the life he dreaded; as in the case of the doctor who was an old bachelor, or more importantly the flaws and failures of the society he lived in. Importantly, Josephine the Singer or The Mouse Folk is a cleverly written depiction of Jewish life in Germany; not only focusing on the struggles of the Jewish race in relation to other races, but also on the internal conflicts of Kafka's kind. These are the artists, the writers, as depicted by Josephine, who among her kind is both resented and loved for her strange gift of singing.Less
This chapter sheds light on the symbolic and almost surreal conflicts present in many of Kafka's celebrated works. It not only looks at his famous novels such as The Metamorphosis, but also his short stories, such as A Country Doctor and Josephine the Singer. Kafka's short stories typically depicted the life he dreaded; as in the case of the doctor who was an old bachelor, or more importantly the flaws and failures of the society he lived in. Importantly, Josephine the Singer or The Mouse Folk is a cleverly written depiction of Jewish life in Germany; not only focusing on the struggles of the Jewish race in relation to other races, but also on the internal conflicts of Kafka's kind. These are the artists, the writers, as depicted by Josephine, who among her kind is both resented and loved for her strange gift of singing.
Elizabeth Boa
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158196
- eISBN:
- 9780191673283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158196.003.0007
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
This chapter again discusses Kafka's views on gender, race, and class, vilely depicted in his famous work The Trial and his succeeding short stories. Kafka lived in an age where the boundaries of ...
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This chapter again discusses Kafka's views on gender, race, and class, vilely depicted in his famous work The Trial and his succeeding short stories. Kafka lived in an age where the boundaries of gender, class, and even race where unstable; that is to say, evolving into something else. The previous chapters already highlighted some of the emerging trends with regard to gender and it is again discussed here, where the once symbolic male image is reduced to a vampire-like beast and where the once moral and matronly women are transformed into aggressive whores. The Trial again highlights the emerging importance of women in general. Though its protagonist's love interest is simply a typist, it is enough to say that Kafka had somehow elevated their position in literature and even respected them; albeit, not to the point that would show their promiscuity. In the end, however, Kafka saw decay in the boundaries of gender, race, and class, wherein the lines between them are increasingly blurred by the changing world and where he finds himself in the middle of it all, powerless to adapt and change.Less
This chapter again discusses Kafka's views on gender, race, and class, vilely depicted in his famous work The Trial and his succeeding short stories. Kafka lived in an age where the boundaries of gender, class, and even race where unstable; that is to say, evolving into something else. The previous chapters already highlighted some of the emerging trends with regard to gender and it is again discussed here, where the once symbolic male image is reduced to a vampire-like beast and where the once moral and matronly women are transformed into aggressive whores. The Trial again highlights the emerging importance of women in general. Though its protagonist's love interest is simply a typist, it is enough to say that Kafka had somehow elevated their position in literature and even respected them; albeit, not to the point that would show their promiscuity. In the end, however, Kafka saw decay in the boundaries of gender, race, and class, wherein the lines between them are increasingly blurred by the changing world and where he finds himself in the middle of it all, powerless to adapt and change.
Elizabeth Boa
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158196
- eISBN:
- 9780191673283
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158196.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
Each story in Kafka's work is laced with metaphors and is a critique of flaws in society. The Castle, in particular, is a metaphor for male power, as evident in the lack of women in the castle. This ...
More
Each story in Kafka's work is laced with metaphors and is a critique of flaws in society. The Castle, in particular, is a metaphor for male power, as evident in the lack of women in the castle. This is in contrast to the village, half of which is women. In a patriarchal society, Kafka notes how women nonetheless have a strong grasp on the affairs of men. Indeed, whilst the Castle is a male-governing authority, it is there to placate a society dominated by women. The implication is hard to ascertain and is as surreal as Kafka's prose, yet it is evident that society is and was growing at a fast pace; faster than its people and even more so for his kind: the writers. In his world, society is the setting for a tragedy, confounded by engines that twist and wheel towards an uncertain future; apathetic towards the people who are thrown into the very eye of chaos.Less
Each story in Kafka's work is laced with metaphors and is a critique of flaws in society. The Castle, in particular, is a metaphor for male power, as evident in the lack of women in the castle. This is in contrast to the village, half of which is women. In a patriarchal society, Kafka notes how women nonetheless have a strong grasp on the affairs of men. Indeed, whilst the Castle is a male-governing authority, it is there to placate a society dominated by women. The implication is hard to ascertain and is as surreal as Kafka's prose, yet it is evident that society is and was growing at a fast pace; faster than its people and even more so for his kind: the writers. In his world, society is the setting for a tragedy, confounded by engines that twist and wheel towards an uncertain future; apathetic towards the people who are thrown into the very eye of chaos.
