Bøger af Simon Critchley

Aristoteles begik selvmord ved at indtage stormhat. Heraklit blev kvalt i komøg. Bentham bad om at blive udstoppet efter sin død og er anbragt i en glasmontre på University College i London. De døde filosoffers bog er et katalog over næsten 200 filosoffers liv og død, fra det antikke Grækenland op til i dag – en enestående samling, der både er en skarp og underholdende introduktion til historiens største tænkere og en livsbekræftende undersøgelse af døden og derigennem livet og muligheden for menneskelig lykke. “Fantastiske og vidunderligt sjove fortællinger… Lad dig ikke skræmme af de mange århundreder – bogen er en fornøjelse at læse.” New York Times

“Fodbold giver os en privilegeret adgang til eviggyldige indsigter i, hvad det vil sige at være menneske.” Hvad tænker vi på, når vi tænker på fodbold? På tid og erindring? På identitet og individualisme? På helte og skurke - eller finter, fejl og snyd? På spillets kollektive natur – som i sit væsen nærmer sig socialisme – midt i dyndet af grådighed og korruption? Eller på fodboldens magi, og hvordan vi tilskuere drages med ind i spillet? Simon Critchley forsøger at finde en mening i det hele – og at vise, hvad det smukke i ‘det smukke spil’ består i.

‘Bowie’ er en filosofisk rejse gennem David Bowies musik, tekstunivers og mange personaer ind til kernen i spørgsmålet om, hvorfor han har betydet så meget for så mange mennesker. Det er en bog om musikeren, som rakte ud efter os og viste os verdener, som vi ikke vidste fandtes – helt i Bowies egen ånd læst ud fra hans værk og kun sjældent hans biografi og privatliv. Simon Critchley er internationalt anerkendt professor i filosofi og livslang Bowie-fan, med rødder i den engelske, grå arbejderforstad som Bowie selv. Critchley er ikke i tvivl om, at Bowie er en af de største kunstnere i de seneste 100 år. Han viser hvorfor – og hvordan hans kunst balancerer mellem fortvivlelse og håb, dystopi og utopi, fravær og begær, mellem død og liv, og hvordan hans spektakulære exit den 10. januar 2016 fletter sig ind i kunstnerens værk. Om tolvårige Critchleys første møde med David Bowie på tv i 1972: “Han virkede så seksuel, så vidende, så underfundig og så fremmedartet. På én gang arrogant og sårbar. Han så ud, som om han havde forstået, hvad det hele gik ud på – hans ansigt var en dør til en verden af ukendte nydelser.”

Through a sweeping historical overview of suicide, a moving literary survey of famous suicide notes, and a psychological analysis of himself, Simon Critchley offers us an insight into what it means to possess the all too human gift and curse of being of being able to choose life or death.

Mysticism is about existential ecstasy - an experience of heightening one's senses and self into a sheer feeling of aliveness. Mystical experiences offer us a practical way to open our thoughts and deepen the sense of our lives, whether through a mainstream connection to God or by taking part in mind-altering experiences. Here, Simon Critchley explores the history and practice of mysticism, from its origins in Eastern and Western religion, through its association with esoteric and occult knowledge, and up to the ecstatic modernism of T.S. Eliot and others. Through a discussion of the lives of famous mystics, like Julian of Norwich and Jesus Christ, Critchley reveals how embracing the spectrum of mystical experience can refresh our thinking and help us live deeper and freer lives.Philosophical and playful, analytical and inventive, On Mysticism is a definitive account of humanity's quest to understand the divine, and a call to thinkers everywhere to broaden our minds to life larger than our selves.

A new and expansive collection of essays from one of the world's best-known popular philosophers

From the moderator of The New York Times philosophy blog"e;The Stone,"e; a book that argues that if we want to understand ourselves we have to go back to theater, to the stage of our livesTragedy presents a world of conflict and troubling emotion, a world where private and public lives collide and collapse. A world where morality is ambiguous and the powerful humiliate and destroy the powerless. A world where justice alwaysseems to be on both sides of a conflict and sugarcoated words serve as cover for clandestine operations of violence. A world rather like our own.The ancient Greeks hold a mirror up to us, in which we see all the desolation and delusion of our lives but also the terrifying beauty and intensity of existence. This is not a time for consolation prizes and the fatuous banalities of the self-help industry and pop philosophy.Tragedy allows us to glimpse, in its harsh and unforgiving glare, the burning core of our aliveness. If we give ourselves the chance to look at tragedy, we might see further and more clearly.

Part of "Radical Thinkers" series, this work presents key texts by philosophers and thinkers. It offers a defense of the political possibilities of deconstruction by unlocking the ethical potential of Derrida's work.

An appreciation of David Bowie - artist, lyricist, performer, icon - including final chapters on Bowie's last album Blackstar.

Using the space of a public gallery as a field for reflection and debate, this volume extends the process of six artists that make up the Sleepwalkers project. The six artists - Clodagh Emoe, Sean Lynch, Gavin Murphy, Linda Quinlan, Jim Ricks, and Lee Welch - have used Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane as a place for research through developing a solo exhibition at the gallery during 2012-14. With each exhibition, the artists investigate the changing role of the museum and curator, as well as the collection and history of the gallery. Pages created by the participating artists are accompanied by essays by Simon Critchley, Chantal Mouffe and other leading curators and cultural theorists. These explore such vital questions as 'what is an exhibition?' and 'how does the form of an exhibition come into being?

A French philosopher dies during a savage summer heat wave. Boxes carrying his unpublished miscellany mysteriously appear in Simon Critchley's office. Rooting through piles of papers, Critchley discovers a brilliant text on the ancient art of memory and a cache of astrological charts predicting the deaths of various philosophers. Among them is a chart for Critchley himself, laying out in great detail the course of his life and eventual demise. Becoming obsessed with the details of his fate, Critchley receives the missing, final box, which contains a maquette of Giulio Camillo's sixteenth-century Venetian memory theatre, a space supposed to contain the sum of all knowledge. That's when the hallucinations begin...

The first book to argue for the ethical turn in Derrida's work, this new edition contains three new appendixes and a new preface where Critchley reflects upon the origins, motivation and reception of 'The Ethics of Deconstruction'.

The clearest, boldest and most systematic statement of Simon Critchley's influential views on philosophy, ethics, and politics, Infinitely Demanding identifies a massive political disappointment at the heart of liberal democracy. Arguing that what is called for is an ethics of commitment that can inform a radical politics, Critchley considers the possibility of political subjectivity and action after Marx and Marxism, taking in the work of Kant, Levinas, Badiou and Lacan. Infinitely Demanding culminates in an argument for anarchism as an ethical practice and a remotivating means of political organization.

This volume takes the form of a debate between Jacques Derrida, the leading exponent of deconstruction, and Richard Rorty, the pragmatist philosopher and literary theorist, in which the two schools of thought are brought into critical confrontation with one another.

Offers an exploration of Heidegger's work. This book argues that we must see "Being and Time" as a radicalization of Husserl's phenomenology, particularly his theories of intentionality, categorial intuition, and the phenomenological concept of the a priori.

A compelling read, Very Little ... Almost Nothing opens up new ways of understanding finitude, modernity and the nature of imagination. Revised edition with a new preface by the author.