Published in 1930, when Japan was struggling to define and assert its national and cultural identity, The Structure of Iki (Iki no kozo) re-introduced the Japanese to a sophisticated tradition of urbane and spirited stylishness (iki) that was forged in the Edo period. Upon his return from Europe, Kuki Shuzo (1888-1941) made use of the new theoretical frameworks based on Western Continental methodology to redefine iki's significance in Japanese society and culture. By applying Heidegger's hermeneutics to this cultural phenomenon, he attempted to recast traditional understanding in the context of Western aesthetic theory and reestablish the centrality of a purely Japanese sense of "taste." Because of its impact on the modern Japanese understanding of traditional culture and character, The Structure of Iki has inspired great interest and debate among scholars examining Kuki's role in the formation of a national aesthetics in the years prior to World War II. The three critical essays that accompany this new translation of The Structure of Iki look at various aspects of Kuki, his work, and the historical context that influenced his thinking. Hiroshi Nara first traces Kuki's interest in a philosophy of life through his exposure to Husserl, Heidegger, and Bergson. In the second essay, J. Thomas Rimer compels readers to reexamine The Structure of Iki as a work in the celebrated tradition of zuihitsu (stream-of-consciousness writings) and takes into account French literary influences on Kuki. The philosopher's controversial link with Heidegger is explored by Jon Mark Mikkelsen in the final essay.
Straw Dogs is an exciting, radical work of philosophy, which sets out to challenge our most cherished assumptions about what it means to be human. From Plato to Christianity, from the Enlightenment to Nietzsche, the Western tradition has been based on the belief that humans are radically different from other animals. Taking inspiration from art, poetry, the frontiers of science, and philosophy itself, John Gray argues that the belief in human difference is an illusion and offers instead a post humanist view of the world. Straw Dogs is an exhilarating, sometimes disturbing, book that explores how the world and human life look once humanism has been finally abandoned.
Who might reasonably be nominated as the funniest philosopher of all time? With this anthology, Thomas Oden provisionally declares Søren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813-1855)--despite his enduring stereotype as the melancholy, despairing Dane--as, among philosophers, the most amusing. Kierkegaard not only explored comic perception to its depths but also practiced the art of comedy as astutely as any writer of his time. This collection shows how his theory of comedy is integrated into his practice of comic perception, and how both are integral to his entire authorship. Kierkegaard's humor ranges from the droll to the rollicking; from farce to intricate, subtle analysis; from nimble stories to amusing aphorisms. In these pages you are invited to meet the wife of an author who burned her husband's manuscript and a businessman who, even with an abundance of calling cards, forgot his own name. You will hear of an interminable vacillator whom archeologists found still pacing thousands of years later, trying to come to a decision. Then there is the emperor who became a barkeeper in order to stay in the know. The Humor of Kierkegaard is for anyone ready to be amused by human follies. Those new to Kierkegaard will discover a dazzling mind worth meeting. Those already familiar with his theory of comedy will be delighted to see it concisely set forth and exemplified. Others may have read Kierkegaard intensively without having ever really noticed his comic side. Here they will find what they have been missing.
In - once again available in paperback - Arthur Danto provides an immensely valuable reassment of this nineteenth-century thinker. By examining all of Nietzche's writiing - on knowledge, language, and philosophical psychology, as well as morality -
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