Baruch Spinoza (1632-1977) is considered one of the great rationalist thinkers of the seventeenth century. His magnum opus, "Ethics", in which he criticized the dualism of Descartes, solidified his reputation and greatly influenced the Enlightenment...

Thousands upon thousands of books have been written about Immanuel Kant since his death. None, let's be clear, have been quite like what we have here. In "Party Fun with Kant", Nicolas Mahler tells the story of Kant – and his fellow serious-minded fi...

The list of subjects that Giorgio Agamben has tackled in his career is dizzying – from the dangers of our current political moment to the traces of the distant past that inflect the culture around us today. With "Pulcinella", Agamben is back with yet...

Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben is the rare writer whose ideas and works have a broad appeal across many fields, and his devoted fans are not just philosophers, but readers of political and legal theory, sociology, and literary criticism as well....

Today, we believe that the map is a copy of the Earth, without realizing that the opposite is true: in our culture the Earth has assumed the form of a map. In "Blinding Polyphemus", Franco Farinelli elucidates the philosophical correlation between cu...

"The Aftermath of War" brings together essays written in Sartre's most creative period, just after World War II. Sartre's extraordinary range of engagement is manifest, with writings on post-war America, the social impact of war in Europe, contempora...

Philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre counted among his friends and associates some of the most esteemed intellectuals, writers, and artists of the twentieth century. In "Portraits" ("Situations IV"), Sartre collected his impressions and accounts of many of h...

"Critical Essays" ("Situations I") contains essays on literature and philosophy from a highly formative period of French philosopher and leading existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre's life, the years between 1938 and 1946. This period is particularly inte...

A poet, philosopher, essayist, playwright, actor, and director, Antonin Artaud was a visionary writer and a major influence within and beyond the French avant-garde. A key text for understanding his thought and his appeal, "50 Drawings to Murder Magi...

Living holds us between two places. It expresses what is most elementary – to be alive – and the absoluteness of our aspiration – finally living! But could we desire anything other than to live? In "The Philosophy of Living", Francois Jullien meditat...