1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910963465303321

Autore

Findlay Edward F. <1965->

Titolo

Caring for the soul in a postmodern age : politics and phenomenology in the thought of Jan Patocka / / Edward F. Findlay

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Albany, : State University of New York Press, c2002

ISBN

9780791488065

0791488063

9780585483009

0585483000

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (267 p.)

Disciplina

199/.437

Soggetti

Philosophy, Modern

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 241-249) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Front Matter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- “Concrete Humans in Their Corporeal World” -- Philosophy After the Death of Metaphysics -- A Philosophy of History and a Theory of Politics -- Politics and Ethics in the Twentieth Century -- Conclusion -- Appendix -- Notes -- Works Cited -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

In 1977 the sixty-nine-year-old Czech philosopher Jan Patočka died from a brain hemorrhage following a series of interrogations by the Czechoslovak secret police. A student of Husserl and Heidegger, he had been arrested, along with young playwright Václav Havel, for publicly opposing the hypocrisy of the Czechoslovak Communist regime. Patočka had dedicated himself as a philosopher to laying the groundwork of what he termed a "life in truth."This book analyzes Patočka's philosophy and political thought and illuminates the synthesis in his work of Socratic philosophy and its injunction to "care for the soul." In bridging the gap, not only between Husserl and Heidegger, but also between postmodern and ancient philosophy, Patočka presents a model of democratic politics that is ethical without being metaphysical, and transcendental without being foundational.