Philosophies of Crime Fiction provides a considered analysis of the philosophical ideas to be found in crime literature - both hidden and explicit. Josef Hoffmann ranges expertly across influences and inspirations in crime writing with a stellar cast including Conan Doyle, G K Chesterton, Dashiell Hammett, Albert Camus, Borges, Agatha Christie, Raymond Chandler and Ted Lewis.Hoffmann examines why crime literature may provide stronger consolation for readers than philosophy. In so d...

Norton celebrates the 150th anniversary of Freud’s birth by reissuing Peter Gay’s best-selling biography, featuring a new introduction.

It has been described as a "tame longing without any particular object" by Schopenhauer, "a bestial and indefinable affliction" by Dostoevsky, and "time's invasion of your world system" by Joseph Brodsky, but still very few of us today can explain precisely what boredom is. A Philosophy of Boredom investigates one of the central preoccupations of our age as it probes the nature of boredom, how it originated, how and why it afflicts us, and why we cannot seem to overcome it by any ...

Alive, fresh, and stimulating, the theme of The Double comprises the issues of identity, narcissism, and the fear of death — actually the core of human existence. Rank’s book is primarily a study of the double as it appeared in striking examples in German, French, Russian, English, and American literature from Goethe to Oscar Wilde.Originally published in 1971.A UNC Press Enduring Edition — UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make av...

The question of how to lead a happy and meaningful life has been at the heart of philosophical debate since time immemorial. Today, however, these questions seem to be addressed not by philosophers but self-help gurus, who frantically champion the individual's quest for self-expression and self-realization; the desire to become authentic.Against these new age sophistries, How to Stop Living and Start Worrying tackles the question of 'how to live' by forcing us to explore o...

Michael Haneke is one of the most important directors working in Europe today, with films such as Funny Games (1997), Code Unknown (2000), and Hidden (2005) interrogating modern ethical dilemmas with forensic clarity and merciless insight. Haneke's films frequently implicate both the protagonists and the audience in the making of their misfortunes, yet even in the barren nihilism of The Seventh Continent (1989) and Time of the Wolf (2003) a dark...

Ludwig Wittgenstein, writes noted scholar Edward Kanterian, was a ‘philosopher’s philosopher’. He was one of the founders of modern analytic philosophy and is regarded as the greatest philosophical genius since Immanuel Kant. In this book, Kanterian traces the complex relationship between the philosopher’s life, his work and his time. The author describes Wittgenstein’s eventful life, his numerous trips, and his friendships with some of the greatest thinkers of the twentieth century, inclu...

As an essayist, Adam Phillips combines the best of two worlds: a mastery of psychotherapy as both practitioner and theorist, and a reputation as one of the best literary writers around. In this collection of essays, he brings these two gifts to bear upon each other, speculating on the relative merits of psychoanalysis and literature and on the connections between them. In his quirky, epigrammatic style, Phillips shows us how psychoanalysis and literature at their best share the goal of she...

During the first year of the first Waldorf school, Rudolf Steiner agreed to give a science course to the teachers, which was to be on the nature of light. At the last minute, he was asked to give an additional course on language, which he improvised. "The Genius of Language" is the result. Steiner demonstrates how history and psychology together form the different languages and how ideas, images, and vocabulary travel through time within various cultural streams. He describes how the power to...

Does humour make us human, or do the cats and dogs laugh along with us? On Humour is a fascinating, beautifully written and funny book on what humour can tell us about being human. Simon Critchley skilfully probes some of the most perennial but least understood aspects of humour, such as our tendency to laugh at animals and our bodies, why we mock death with comedy and why we think it's funny when people act like machines. He also looks at the darker side of humour, as rife in sex...

The books in this bite-sized new series contain no complicated techniques or tricky materials, making them ideal for the busy, the time-pressured or the merely curious. Existentialism Made Easy is a short, simple and to-the-point guide to existentialism. In just 96 pages, the reader will discover all the key ideas, from altruism to utilitarianism. Ideal for the busy, the time-pressured or the merely curious, Existentialism Made Easy is a quick, no-effort way to break into this fascinating ...

An Introduction to Narratology is an accessible, practical guide to narratological theory and terminology and its application to literature.In this book, Monika Fludernik outlines:the key concepts of style, metaphor and metonymy, and the history of narrative formsnarratological approaches to interpretation and the linguistic aspects of texts, including new cognitive developments in the fieldhow students can use narratological the...