Book picks similar to
Schiller as Philosopher: A Re-Examination by Frederick C. Beiser


philosophy
german-idealism
history-and-genealogy
philorhetical-critical

Adam Smith: An Enlightened Life


Nicholas Phillipson - 2010
    Yet Smith saw himself primarily as a philosopher rather than an economist and would never have predicted that the ideas for which he is now best known were his most important. This biography shows the extent to which Smith's great works, The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments, were part of one of the most ambitious projects of the Euruopean Enlightenment, a grand “Science of Man" that would encompass law, history, and aesthetics as well as economics and ethics, and which was only half complete on Smith’s death in 1790.Nick Phillipson reconstructs Smith’s intellectual ancestry and shows what Smith took from, and what he gave to, in the rapidly changing intellectual and commercial cultures of Glasgow and Edinburgh as they entered the great years of the Scottish Enlightenment. Above all he explains how far Smith’s ideas developed in dialogue with those of his closest friend, the other titan of the age, David Hume.

Phenomenology: The Basics


Dan Zahavi - 2008
    This lively and lucid book provides an introduction to the essential phenomenological concepts that are crucial for understanding great thinkers such as Husserl, Heidegger, and Merleau-Ponty. Written by a leading expert in the field, Dan Zahavi examines and explains key questions such as:- What is a phenomenological analysis?- What are the methodological foundations of phenomenology?- What does phenomenology have to say about embodiment and intersubjectivity?- How is phenomenology distinguished from, and related to, other fields in philosophy?- How do ideas from classic phenomenology relate to ongoing debates in psychology and qualitative research?With a glossary of key terms and suggestions for further reading, the book considers key philosophical arguments around phenomenology, making this an ideal starting point for anyone seeking a concise and accessible introduction to the rich and complex study of phenomenology.

How to Be Holy: First Steps in Becoming a Saint


Peter Kreeft - 2016
    This question is central to all the great religions, Kreeft demonstrates, for striving toward holiness, moving toward perfect love, is the whole purpose of life.Kreeft admits that he is only a beginner on the climb to holiness, and it is to novices like him that he has written this engaging and encouraging book. Using the insights and experiences of saints and great spiritual writers throughout history, Kreeft shows what holiness is and how it can be achieved. He especially draws upon the spiritual classic Abandonment to Divine Providence by Jean-Pierre de Caussade, S.J. The core of Caussade's timeless gem is that God reveals himself to all of us through the daily events of our lives. The surest way toward spiritual growth, therefore, is by perceiving and accepting the merciful will of God in every situation.Kreeft stresses the simplicity of his approach to holiness, which focuses mainly on the virtue of love. Sanctity is love, he asserts, and only that can give us what we all long for—deep and lasting joy.

Writing History, Writing Trauma


Dominick LaCapra - 2000
    In Writing History, Writing Trauma, Dominick LaCapra provides a broad-ranging, critical inquiry into the problem of trauma, notably with respect to major historical events. In a series of interlocking essays, he explores theoretical and literary-critical attempts to come to terms with trauma as well as the crucial role post-traumatic testimonies—particularly Holocaust testimonies—have assumed in recent thought and writing. In doing so, he adapts psychoanalytic concepts to historical analysis and employs sociocultural and political critique to elucidate trauma and its after effects in culture and in people.In the first chapter LaCapra addresses trauma from the perspective of history as a discipline. He then lays a theoretical groundwork for the book as a whole, exploring the concept of historical specificity and insisting on the difference between transhistorical and historical trauma. Subsequent chapters consider how Holocaust testimonies raise the problem of the role of affect and empathy in historical understanding, and respond to the debates surrounding Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's book Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. The book's concluding essay, "Writing (About) Trauma," examines the various ways that the voice of trauma emerges in written and oral accounts of historical events. Theoretically ambitious and historically informed, Writing History, Writing Trauma is an important contribution from one of today's foremost experts on trauma.

Aspects of Wagner


Bryan Magee - 1969
    The man who W.H. Auden once called perhaps the greatest genius that ever lived has inspired both greater adulation and greater loathing than any other composer. Bryan Magee presents a penetrating analysis of Wagner's work, concentrating on how his sensational and deeply erotic music uniquely expresses the repressed and highly charged contents of the psyche. He examines not only Wagner's music and detailed stage directions but also the prose works in which he formulated his ideas, as well as shedding new light on his anti-semitism and the way in which the Nazis twisted his theories to suit their own purposes. Outlining the astonishing range and depth of Wagner's influence on our culture, Magee reveals how profoundly he continues to shock and inspire musicians, poets, novelists, painters, philosophers, and politicians today.

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King Summary & Study Guide


BookRags - 2010
    36 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more – everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft. This detailed literature summary also contains Topics for Discussion and a Free Quiz on On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King.

Rotten English: A Literary Anthology


Dohra AhmadJunot Díaz - 2007
    During the last twelve years, half of the Man Booker awards went to novels written in non-standard English. What would once have been derogatorily termed "dialect literature" has come into its own in a language known variously as slang, creole, patois, pidgin, or, in the words of Nigerian novelist Ken Saro-Wiwa, "rotten English."The first anthology of its kind, "Rotten English" celebrates vernacular literature from around the English-speaking world, from Robert Burns, Mark Twain, and Zora Neale Hurston to Papua New Guinea's John Kasaipwalova and Tobago's Marlene Nourbese Philip. With concise introductions that explain the context and aesthetics of the vernacular tradition, Rotten English pays tribute to the changes English has undergone as it has become a global language.Contents:"Raal right singin'": vernacular poetry. Colonization in reverse" and Bans O'killing by Louise BennettWings of a dove by Kamau BrathwaiteAuld lang syne, Highland Mary, and "Bonnie Lesley" by Robert BurnsA negro love song and When Malindy sings by Paul Laurence DunbarMother to son and Po' boy blues by Langston HughesInglan is a bitch by Linton Kwesi JohnsonWukhand by Paul Keens-DouglasTommy by Rudyard KiplingUnrelated incidents-no.3 by Tom LeonardComin back ower the border by Mary McCabeQuashie to Buccra by Claude McKayDis poem by MutabarukaQuestions! Questions! by M. NourbeSe Philipno more love poems #1 by Ntozake Shange"So like I say ... ": vernacular short stories. Po' Sandy by Charles ChestnuttThe brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao by Junot DiazLetters from Whetu by Patricia GraceSpunk and Story in Harlem slang by Zora Neale HurstonBetel nut is bad magic for airplanes by John KasaipwalovaJoebell and America by Earl LovelaceThe ghost of Firozsha Baag by Rohinton MistryThe celebrated jumping frog of Calaveras County and A True story, repeated word for word as I heard it by Mark TwainA soft touch and Granny's old junk by Irvine WelshOnly the dead know Brooklyn by Thomas Wolfe. "I wanna say I am somebody": selections from vernacular novels. from True history of the Kelly Gang by Peter Careyfrom The snapper by Roddy Doylefrom Once there were warriors by Alan DuffAn overture to the commencement of a very rigid journey by Jonathan Safran Foerfrom Beasts of no nation by Uzodinma IwealaBaywatch and de preacher from Tide running by Oonya KempadooFace, from Rolling the R's by R. Zamora Linmarkfrom Londonstani by Gautam Malkanifrom No mate for the magpie by Frances Molloyfrom Push by Sapphirefrom Sozaboy: a novel in rotten English by Ken Saro-Wiwafrom The housing lark by Sam Selvon. "A new English": essays on vernacular literature. The African writer and the English. language by Chinua AchebeHow to tame a wild tongue by Gloria AnzalduaIf Black English isn't a language, then tell me what is? by James Baldwinfrom History of the voice: the development of nation language in Anglophone Caribbean poetry by Kamau Brathwaitefrom Minute on Indian education by Thomas MacaulayAfrican speech ... English words by Gabriel OkaraThe absence of writing or How I almost became a spy by M. NourbeSe PhilipMother tongue by Amy Tan

Shakespeare Lexicon and Quotation Dictionary, Vol. 1


Alexander Schmidt - 1874
    The lifetime work of Professor Alexander Schmidt of Königsberg, this book has long been the indispensable companion for every person seriously interested in Shakespeare, Renaissance poetry and prose of any sort, or English literature. It is really two important books in one.Schmidt’s set contains every single word that Shakespeare used, not simply words that have changed their meaning since the seventeenth century, but every word in all the accepted plays and the poems. Covering both quartos and folios, it carefully distinguishes between shades of meaning for each word and provides exact definitions, plus governing phrases and locations, down to the numbered line of the Cambridge edition of Shakespeare. There is no other word dictionary comparable to this work.Even more useful to the general reader, however, is the incredible wealth of exact quotations. Arranged under the words of the quotation itself (hence no need to consult confusing subject classifications) are more than 50,000 exact quotations. Each is precisely located, so that you can easily refer back to the plays or poems themselves, if you wish context.Other features helpful to the scholar are appendixes on basic grammatical observations, a glossary of provincialisms, a list of words and sentences taken from foreign languages, a list of words that form the latter part of word-combinations. This third edition features a supplement with new findings.

Critique of Pure Reason


Immanuel Kant - 1781
    It presents a profound and challenging investigation into the nature of human reason, its knowledge and its illusions. Reason, Kant argues, is the seat of certain concepts that precede experience and make it possible, but we are not therefore entitled to draw conclusions about the natural world from these concepts. The Critique brings together the two opposing schools of philosophy: rationalism, which grounds all our knowledge in reason, and empiricism, which traces all our knowledge to experience. Kant's transcendental idealism indicates a third way that goes far beyond these alternatives.

The Necessity of Atheism and Other Essays


Percy Bysshe Shelley - 1993
    As Shelley observes in his dialogue "A Refutation of Deism," there can be no middle ground between accepting revealed religion and disbelieving in the existence of a diety - another way of stating the necessity of atheism.In all, these essays provide an important statement of the poet and freethinker's enlightened views on skepticism, faith, and the corruption of organized Christianity

Face of God: The Gifford Lectures


Roger Scruton - 2012
    His argument is a response to the atheist culture that is now growing around us, and also a defence of human uniqueness. He rebuts the claim that there is no meaning or purpose in the natural world, and argues that the sacred and the transcendental are 'real presences', through which human beings come to know themselves and to find both their freedom and their redemption. In the human face we find a paradigm of meaning. And from this experience, Scruton argues, we both construct the face of the world, and address the face of God. We find in the face both the proof of our freedom and the mark of self-consciousness. One of the motivations of the atheist culture is to escape from the eye of judgement. You escape from the eye of judgement by blotting out the face: and this, Scruton argues, is the most disturbing aspect of the times in which we live. In his wide-ranging argument Scruton explains the growing sense of destruction that we feel, as the habits of pleasure seeking and consumerism deface the world. His book defends a consecrated world against the habit of desecration, and offers a vision of the religious way of life in a time of trial.

Hellenistic Philosophy: Stoics, Epicureans, Sceptics


Anthony A. Long - 1974
    to the end of the Roman Republic (31 B.C.).

122 Zen Koans


Taka Washi - 2013
    Find enlightenment with these one-hundred twenty-two traditional Buddhist Zen koans -- stories, dialogues, questions, or statements, used in Zen-practice to provoke the "great doubt," and test a student's progress in Zen practice.

Free Speech & Postmodernism


Stephen R.C. Hicks - 2010
    The attacks have come not only from traditional conservatives but increasingly from the postmodern left. In this essay, Stephen Hicks presents and dissects the philosophical arguments made by the postmoderns for speech restrictions and responds with a vigorous and updated liberal case for free speech.

Gilles Deleuze & Félix Guattari: Intersecting Lives


François Dosse - 2007
    Félix Guattari was a political militant and the director of an unusual psychiatric clinic at La Borde. Their meeting was quite unlikely, yet the two were introduced in an arranged encounter of epic consequence. From that moment on, Deleuze and Guattari engaged in a surprising, productive partnership, collaborating on several groundbreaking works, including "Anti-Oedipus," "What Is Philosophy?" and "A Thousand Plateaus."Fran?ois Dosse, a prominent French intellectual known for his work on the Annales School, structuralism, and biographies of the pivotal intellectuals Paul Ricoeur, Pierre Chaunu, and Michel de Certeau, examines the prolific if improbable relationship between two men of distinct and differing sensibilities. Drawing on unpublished archives and hundreds of personal interviews, Dosse elucidates a collaboration that lasted more than two decades, underscoring the role that family and history--particularly the turbulent time of May 1968--play in their monumental work. He also takes the measure of Deleuze and Guattari's posthumous fortunes and the impact of their thought on intellectual, academic, and professional circles.