Category: meditation
-
On Fish’s ‘Does Philosophy Matter?’ Answer: No…and yes
Philip Carey, the protagonist of Somerset Maugham’s Of Human Bondage, is deeply confused. On the one hand, he has rejected revealed religion and thus does not believe in God. On the one hand, his moral principles uncannily resemble those found in Christianity. On his list of virtues are charity, compassion, humility, and love. It occurs…
-
Moral education in Maugham’s Of Human Bondage
I’m about halfway through Somerset Maugham’s novel Of Human Bondage (1915). As the editors tell us in the introduction, the novel was originally written when Maugham was in his 20s but because Maugham couldn’t find a publisher he filed it away in his writing desk. After some commercial success years later, he returned to the…
-
On 3 moods toward the past: smashing, worshipping, and loving while transcending
The 1st Mood: The Past Must be Smashed. “We want to demolish museums and libraries, fight morality, feminism and all opportunist and utilitarian cowardice.” –F.T. Marinetti, The Futurist Manifesto (1909) “The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past.” –Faulkner Thanks to Faulkner, Ibsen, and Chekhov, we recognize that the past cannot be wiped out or destroyed. In…
-
A philosophical review of Geoff Dyer’s Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi
Geoff Dyer’s novel Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi, published in 2009, might just as well have been a play or a dialogue. The first part takes place in Venice, the second part in Varanasi. The protagonist Jeff Atman–yes, that is his surname–is a freelance journalist who writes about art, music, and celebrity. He attends…
-
On relics and textiles and spiritual weight
There aren’t a lot of relics lying around these days. Occasionally, someone finds the likeness of Mary or Mother Theresa in a pancake or in a splintered oak tree. Then TV crews flock to the scene and interview the yokels. A bunch of bunk that. Makes for good TV though, something that Murdoch knew. More…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 