Tag: books
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Welt und Zeit—Acumen & Evil, 04:48—1. March 2025
Acumen, that razor-edged acuity of mind, occupies a paradoxical space at the intersection of knowledge and morality. It denotes a keen, incisive intelligence—a capacity to discern subtleties and penetrate complexities—and yet this very sharpness can cut either way. We often celebrate acumen as a virtue of the intellect, but the ontological question arises: what is…
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Welt und Zeit—Tutankamon, The Son-King, 22:58—27. February 2025
Time and myth combine in a tense fabric of human reality, where ancient narratives echo through the ages to fracture eras and fuel conflicts. In the present day’s turbulent political events, one discerns the shadows of primordial mythological structures—old gods and founding heroes haunting modern battlefields. The life of the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankamon (Tutankhamun) offers…
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Eraserhead, The David Lynch Files: Volume 1: The Full Story of One of the Strangest Films Ever Made.
A mesmerizing portrait of artistic perseverance and cinematic innovation, Eraserhead, The David Lynch Files: Volume 1 by Kenneth George Godwin unfolds as a strikingly thorough account of one of cinema’s most confounding and compelling debuts. Written at a time when the film was still a fresh wound in the collective imagination, it combines rigorous journalistic…
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Welt und Zeit—Disgusting Sexuality, Sex & Disgust, 20:35—23. February 2025
The intersection of sexuality is struck with the immediate affective realm of disgust, and one is invariably drawn into an ever-expanding contemplation that touches upon the most fundamental nature of being. The trajectory of this reflection, framed within the broader horizon often invoked by the name of World & Time, finds itself confronted by contradictions,…
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Welt und Zeit—Of the Abyss & the Void, 20:27—22. February 2025
In the tremors of our contemporary world, where the horizon of certainty has fractured under the weight of unprecedented shifts, one confronts two primordial dimensions that shape every aspect of existence: the abyss and the void. The two, at once unsettling and generative, stand at the heart of the human project, calling into question the…
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Welt und Zeit—The Fragmentation of Ontology, 20:21—21. Februar 2025
In the unfolding of world and time, understood here in the broadest sense as both a continuation of what has been laid down before and as a new philosophical investigation into the essence of Being, we confront the horizon of ontology in its most expansive form. The present text seeks to disclose the subtle yet…
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Welt und Zeit—Disaster, 18:19—11. Februar 2025
Disaster is a threshold concept that captures the rupture, the sudden and devastating break, that disrupts the continuity of collective life. It conjures visions of apocalypse, catastrophe, cataclysm, ruin, and end, all of which speak to the collapse of presumed orders and the shattering of expectations. While the word “disaster” can be applied to singular…
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The Shock Doctrine: the Rise of Disaster Capitalism
In an era where chaos reigns and disasters unfold with alarming frequency, Naomi Klein’s seminal work, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, emerged as an unsettling exploration of how power is wielded amidst turmoil. Heralded by luminaries such as John le Carré, who described it as “impassioned, hugely informative, wonderfully controversial, and scary…
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G.W.F. Hegel: The Philosophical Propaedeutic
The Philosophical Propaedeutic is a unique and invaluable entry in the corpus of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, offering an accessible yet profound encapsulation of his mature philosophical system. Composed between 1808 and 1811 as notes for his lectures, this work distills the complexities of Hegel’s thought into a form that retains both simplicity and depth,…
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Hegel: A Biography
Terry Pinkard’s Hegel: A Biography presents a masterful examination of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel’s life and thought, contextualized in the tumultuous intellectual and political landscape of late 18th and early 19th-century Europe. Pinkard offers more than a mere chronology of events, he analyses the philosophical currents that shaped Hegel’s worldview, placing him not only as…
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Philosophy of History: An Introduction
William H. Walsh’s Philosophy of History: An Introduction, first published in 1951 and subsequently revised, stands as a pivotal exploration of how historians conceptualize, interpret, and present the past in light of philosophical reflection. It offers a long and deeply reasoned commentary on the processes by which historical knowledge is both formed and tested. Within…
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Philosophical Variations: Music as Philosophical Language
In Philosophical Variations: Music as Philosophical Language, Andrew Bowie presents a collection of essays that offer a sweeping examination of how musical practice, philosophy, and literary understanding converge upon, challenge, and illuminate each other, thereby reshaping our sense of what it means to think and to listen. The author, Professor of Philosophy and German at…
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Myth and Mayhem: A Leftist Critique of Jordan Peterson
In the tumultuous landscape of neoliberal post-modernity, few intellectual figures have ignited as much fervent debate and polarized discourse as Jordan Peterson. Rising to prominence in the 2010s, Peterson’s meteoric ascent was fuelled by his contentious stance against what he terms “postmodern neo-Marxism,” alongside his forays into a diverse array of subjects ranging from lobster…
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Freedom and Nature in Schelling’s Philosophy of Art
Freedom and Nature in Schelling’s Philosophy of Art by Devin Zane Shaw presents an exhaustive philosophical analysis of the relationship between freedom, nature, and art in the thought of Friedrich Schelling. This work illuminates the evolution of Schelling’s philosophical system from his early engagements with Kantian and Fichtean idealism through to his theological turn in…
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Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990
Katja Hoyer’s Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949–1990 is a monumental work of historical excavation, an incisive and deeply textured reconstruction of a state that vanished yet lingers in memory, myth, and the fault lines of German identity. This extraordinary book offers nothing less than the definitive account of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), navigating…
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‘For They Know Not What They Do: Enjoyment as a Political Factor’ by Slavoj Žižek
For They Know Not What They Do: Enjoyment as a Political Factor by Slavoj Žižek is a dazzling interrogation of ideology, enjoyment, and the political deadlocks of modernity. In this monumental work, Žižek builds upon a provocative premise: the combination of ignorance and enjoyment is not merely incidental to ideological discourse but is foundational to…
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Tyranny and Revolution: Rousseau to Heidegger
Waller R. Newell’s Tyranny and Revolution: Rousseau to Heidegger invites the reader into a vast intellectual landscape stretching from the twilight of the ancient world to the cataclysms of twentieth-century totalitarianism and beyond. In its scope, it captures the restless efforts of modern philosophers, beginning with Rousseau, to restore a sense of integral community and…
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Friedrich Nietzsche: Human, All Too Human
The following text is a depiction so unrelenting in the thoroughness of its philosophical inquiry, so immoderate in the density of its conceptual detail, that it seems to stand as a great cavern of thought into which the attentive reader must plunge, armed with nothing but the steadfastness of one’s reason and the lucidity of…
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Nietzsche and the Shadow of God
Nietzsche and the Shadow of God is a work that ventures into the fraught terrain where Nietzsche’s philosophy confronts the two-thousand-year-old religious heritage of the West. Didier Franck’s study, here introduced for the first time to English-speaking audiences through a careful and readable translation by Bettina Bergo and Philippe Farah, does not aim at either…
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Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Gay Science: With a Prelude in German Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs
This new edition of Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Gay Science, with a Prelude in German Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs, translated by Josefine Nauckhoff and introduced by Bernard Williams, offers a transformative encounter with one of Nietzsche’s central works, a text that the philosopher himself once described as “perhaps my most personal book.” Written at…
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Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits (Revised Edition)
In approaching the Revised Edition of Friedrich Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits, as translated by Marion Faber and Stephen Lehmann, with an introduction and introductory notes by Arthur C. Danto, one is immediately struck by the unique historical and philosophical significance of this work and by the profound care with…
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Friedrich Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits
Friedrich Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits presents a striking departure from his earlier, more romantic and metaphysical works, marking a pivotal moment in his intellectual evolution. This collection, which contains almost 1,400 aphorisms, was originally published in three installments between 1878 and 1880. It reflects Nietzsche’s shift from his previous…
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Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Dawn of Day
Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Dawn of Day (1881), translated by J. M. Kennedy, is a seminal work in the development of Nietzsche’s philosophical journey, bridging his earlier explorations and his later, more fully developed ideas. The book, a collection of aphorisms and prose poems, represents a profound moment in Nietzsche’s intellectual maturation. Written during a period…
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Nietzsche: Daybreak – Thoughts on the Prejudices of Morality
In Daybreak: Thoughts on the Prejudices of Morality, Nietzsche embarks on a bold critique of traditional morality that not only challenges its assumptions but also lays the groundwork for his larger philosophical project—a radical revaluation of values that would come to define his mature work. The book represents a significant turning point in Nietzsche’s intellectual…
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Nietzsche’s Enlightenment: The Free-Spirit Trilogy of the Middle Period
In Nietzsche’s Enlightenment: The Free-Spirit Trilogy of the Middle Period, Paul Franco offers a comprehensive and insightful presentation of Friedrich Nietzsche’s works from his so-called middle period, a phase often overlooked or misunderstood in the broader sweep of Nietzschean scholarship. This middle period consists of three central works—Human, All Too Human, Daybreak, and The Gay…
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Nietzsche’s Journey to Sorrento: Genesis of the Philosophy of the Free Spirit
Nietzsche’s Journey to Sorrento: Genesis of the Philosophy of the Free Spirit by Paolo D’Iorio, as translated by Sylvia Gorelick, offers an in-depth and revealing portrait of Friedrich Nietzsche during a pivotal moment in his life and philosophy. In this compelling narrative, D’Iorio goes into the deep transformation Nietzsche experienced while spending time in southern…
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Nietzsche’s Free Spirit Philosophy
In Nietzsche’s Free Spirit Philosophy, Rebecca Bamford brings together an eclectic and sophisticated array of essays that illuminate the largely under-explored yet foundational concept of the “free spirit” in Nietzsche’s philosophy. This concept, which emerges in Nietzsche’s middle period, is particularly prominent in works like Human, All Too Human, Dawn (or Daybreak), and The Gay…
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Nietzsche’s Free Spirit Works: A Dialectical Reading
Matthew Meyer’s Nietzsche’s Free Spirit Works: A Dialectical Reading offers a key interpretation of Nietzsche’s middle period works, which span from 1878 to 1882 and include Human, All Too Human, Assorted Opinions and Maxims, The Wanderer and His Shadow, Daybreak, and The Gay Science. These texts, often dismissed as mere collections of aphorisms, are, according…
Simon Gros 