Philosophy

That Anatomy of Melancholy

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The Anatomy of Melancholy (Paperback)

By Robert Burton, William H. Gass (Introduction by)
$29.95
ISBN: 9780940322660
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: NYRB Classics - April 30th, 2001

 

John Keats’ favorite book – with admirers ranging from Samuel Johnson to Philip Pullman, Laurence Sterne to Samuel Beckett, Washington Irving to Jorge Luis Borges, George Custer to Nick Cave – infinite in its jest, encyclopedic in its scholarship, delightful in its relish for human contradiction and wholehearted in its compassion for our folly, here lies a book for your desert island. Sample a page from the “Mind Rectified by Mirth” (II.119). If you are not convinced, I will say no more. Lætitiae cœlum vos creavit. So live merrily, O my friends.

James

Confessions of a Heretic

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Confessions of a Heretic: Selected Essays (Hardcover)

By Roger Scruton
$18.95
ISBN: 9781910749128
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Notting Hill Editions - March 28th, 2017

A delightfully controversial book, there is much here to chew on. Witty, thoughtful, and occasionally funny, Scruton's insight is both timely and timeless in a world where sometimes we just need to slow down and look.

Matthew

Confession

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A Confession (Penguin Great Ideas) (Paperback)

By Leo Tolstoy
$11.00
ISBN: 9780141042558
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Penguin Books - October 27th, 2009

Best known for his popular novels like Anna Karenina and War and Peace, later in life, Tolstoy experienced a profound existential and spiritual crisis causing him to renounce his fame and many of his past writings. Confession is his existential autobiography composed as Leo Tolstoy grappled with life's meaning.

Matt

Travels with Epicurus

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Travels with Epicurus: A Journey to a Greek Island in Search of a Fulfilled Life (Hardcover)

By Daniel Klein
$20.00
ISBN: 9780143121930
Availability: Available at Warehouse
Published: Penguin Books - October 30th, 2012

Taking Epicurus as his guide, Klein meditates on a philosophy of old age while on an extended visit to the Greek Island of Hydra. His choice of epigraph neatly sums up the heart of this little gem of a book, “Not what we have, but what we enjoy constitutes our abundance.”

Dale

Thrown

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Thrown (Paperback)

By Kerry Howley
$15.95
ISBN: 9781936747924
Availability: Available at Warehouse
Published: Sarabande Books - October 14th, 2014

Unlike anything you've ever read, THROWN is a philosophical exploration of what it means to be alive through the lens of Mixed Martial Arts. The work of an intense intellect, THROWN uses the lives of two fighters to struggle with the biggest questions of experience, very directly fighting for meaning and significance in our chaotic and confusing world. A major work by a major mind.

Josh

Plato at the Googleplex

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Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away (Hardcover)

By Rebecca Goldstein
$29.95
ISBN: 9780307378194
Availability: Hard to Find--Contact us for More Info
Published: Pantheon Books - March 4th, 2014

This book deals with the heavy-duty subject of Greek philosophy - specifically, Plato - yet manages to be incredibly readable, accessible and entertaining. Goldstein places Plato in a variety of modern day situations (a visit to Google, authors' book tour, cable talk show and others) and has him engage in dialogues with people around him. Her point is to show that the questions he wrestled with are still the important questions, and that this stuff still matters. And is cool.

David

The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning

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The Art of Cruelty: A Reckoning (Paperback)

By Maggie Nelson
$16.95
ISBN: 9780393343144
Availability: Available at Warehouse
Published: W. W. Norton & Company - August 13th, 2012

This
is one of the best works of criticism in recent memory.  Nelson
examines everything from Yoko Ono’s weird performance art to the
contemporary horror flick in a sweeping attempt to understand the nature
of cruelty in art and determine how moral beings might navigate a world
enriched and complicated by it.  Her voice is incendiary, sensitive,
and thoroughly unpretentious.  Though I was a fan way back at Jane: A Murder, The Art of Cruelty put Maggie Nelson on the map as a thinker to watch.Kim

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