Monthly Archives: December 2019

Who’s In Charge Here?

Posted on December 31, 2019 by Abigail

Who’s In Charge Here? Today I read an essay about the meaning of life. It was written in the form of a book review by Peter Brooks of The Storyteller Essays by Walter Benjamin. The review appears in the current … Continue reading →

Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Academe, Action, Afterlife, Alienation, Art, Art of Living, Atheism, Autonomy, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, books, Christianity, Cities, Class, Contemplation, Contradictions, Cultural Politics, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Eternity, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, Faith, Fashion, Freedom, Gender Balance, glitterati, Guilt and Innocence, Hegel, Heroes, hidden God, History, history of ideas, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Immorality, Jews, Judaism, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Masculinity, master/slave relation, Memoir, memory, Mind Control, Modernism, Moral action, Moral evaluation, Moral psychology, morality, Mortality, novels, Past and Future, Phenomenology of Mind, Philosophy, politics of ideas, post modernism, Power, presence, promissory notes, Psychology, Public Intellectual, Reading, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, Romance, scientism, secular, self-deception, social climbing, social construction, Social Conventions, social ranking, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, Spirituality, status, status of women, Suffering, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Men, The Problematic of Woman, the profane, the sacred, Theism, Theology, Time, twenty-first century, victimhood, victims, Violence, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist | Tagged "New York Review of Books", accessing one's situation, administrative savvy, bad luck, belief systems, Bible stories, Bible study, causation in history, chance or design, cover story, death scene, discerning meaning, disciplined life, divine guidance, divine influence, Egyptian bondage, erotic temptation, failure as opportunity, failure’s lessons, family reconciliation, favorite son, fiction as instructive, fictional heroes, fictional life, fractured kneecap, fratricidal feeling, God as Co-Author, God in control, Hebrew Bible, History, housebound, how the story ends, imaginary character, intelligent choice, Joseph in Egypt, life plotline, life review, living intelligently, making lemonade out of lemons, Master Blueprint, meaning of history, meaning of life, moral framework, moral society, Moses, narrative closure, novelistic Bible stories, novelistic outlook, novelistic view, Peter Brooks’s review of The Storyteller Essays by Walter Benjamin, phenomenological reduction, political smarts, promised land, providential influence, randomness of experience, rationalization, recognition scene, reconciliation, reunion scene, roll of the dice, self-awareness, self-correcting, selling your brother, sibling rivalry, sophisticated readers, the choices we make, the Joseph story, the novel, Walter Benjamin’s The Storyteller Essays, working the room, wrongly accused | 2 Comments

Book Matters

Posted on December 24, 2019 by Abigail

Book Matters Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave Written by Himself by Frederick Douglass, edited by Benjamin Quarles I know of no book, and no reading experience, like this one. Years ago, I read Uncle Tom’s … Continue reading →

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The Moral Markers

Posted on December 17, 2019 by Abigail

The Moral Markers From time to time, I pause to picture how the recent phases of my life would look to me if there were no God in the pictures. It’s a sort of thought experiment. Philosophers are given to … Continue reading →

Posted in Absurdism, Action, Alienation, Anthropology, Art of Living, Atheism, Autonomy, books, Class, conformism, Contemplation, Contradictions, Cool, cults, Cultural Politics, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, exploitation, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Freedom, Friendship, glitterati, Gnosticism, Guilt and Innocence, Health, hegemony, hidden God, hierarchy, History, history of ideas, ID, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Idolatry, Immorality, Institutional Power, Journalism, Legal Responsibility, life and death struggle, Literature, Masculinity, Memoir, memory, Mind Control, Modernism, Moral action, Moral evaluation, Moral psychology, morality, Mortality, nineteenth-century, novels, Ontology, Oppression, Past and Future, Peace, Philosophy, Political Movements, politics of ideas, post modernism, Power, presence, promissory notes, Propaganda, Psychology, public facade, Public Intellectual, radicalism, Reading, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, scientism, secular, Seduction, self-deception, social climbing, social construction, Social Conventions, social ranking, Sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, Spirituality, status, status of women, Suffering, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Men, The Problematic of Woman, the profane, the sacred, Theism, Theology, Time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, victimhood, Violence, War, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist | Tagged abstraction, absurdity, agnostic, Atheism, atheistic world view, Authenticity, beyond good and evil, brute forces, complementarity in friendship, concrete experience, consequential decisions, constructive orientation, controlled experiment, cynicism, deleted datum, erasing evidence, experimental confirmation, experimental disconfirmation, false consciousness, fashionable abstractions, fashionable views, feigned belief, fork in the road, Friedrich Nietzsche, integrating experience, limited palette, loyalty v betrayal, Martin Heidegger, meaning of life, meaningful life, models of the ultimate, modern life, Modernity, moral choice, moral fork in the road, moral indices, moral markers, moral neutrality, no rhyme or reason, novelistic plotline, objectivity claims, opinion shapers, opposites attract, pointlessness, power relations, projection, random energy, reality as absurd, relationship dynamics, Social Darwinism, social pretense, survival of the fittest, Swedish descent, the Modern world, the Post-Modern world, theism, theistic world view, thought experiment, Valhalla, Vedantist, Viking worldview | Leave a comment

Lost Innocence and Tanya Tucker

Posted on December 10, 2019 by Abigail

Lost Innocence and Tanya Tucker Tanya Tucker hasn’t put out a country album in 17 years. While she’s been… wherever she’s been… country music has changed and now resembles rock ‘n roll. There’s a heavy, percussive roar behind virtually every … Continue reading →

Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Action, Alienation, American Politics, Art, Art of Living, Autonomy, beauty, Biblical God, Chivalry, Christianity, conformism, Contradictions, Cool, Courage, Courtship, Cultural Politics, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Ethics, Evil, exploitation, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Films, Freedom, Friendship, Gender Balance, Guilt and Innocence, hegemony, Heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history of ideas, ID, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Journalism, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Male Power, Masculinity, Memoir, memory, Mind Control, Modernism, Moral action, Moral evaluation, Moral psychology, morality, Mortality, nineteenth-century, Oppression, Past and Future, Philosophy, Poetry, Political Movements, politics of ideas, post modernism, Power, presence, Psychology, public facade, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, Romance, Romantic Love, Romanticism, scientism, secular, Seduction, self-deception, Sex Appeal, Sexuality, social ranking, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, Spirituality, status, status of women, Suffering, Terror, terrorism, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Men, The Problematic of Woman, the profane, the sacred, Theism, Theology, Time, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, victimhood, victims, Violence, War, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist | Tagged 19th century German philosophers, 19th century Romanticism, a real woman, Appalachian music, Arthur Schopenhauer, CMT videos, country album, country gospel, country hits, country music, country music v rock ’n’ roll, country songwriters, cowboy heroes, feminine survival, Friedrich Nietzsche, goodness and badness, integrity and wickedness, ISIS rapist, ISIS survivor, Ken Burns’s Country Music, lasting lust, Leo Bronstein, loss of innocence, love v lust, loving one’s life, old time virtue and vice, philosopher of art, rape victims, sex and ideas, Sigmund Freud, storytelling songs, surviving lost innocence, Tanya Tucker, Tanya Tucker's While I'm Livin', the good of being bad, the singer’s gift, the youth market, trauma and art, truth-telling woman, victims condemnation, Willie Nelson, Willie Nelson’s The Last Man Standing, worldwide country music fans | Leave a comment

Book Matters

Posted on December 3, 2019 by Abigail

The Exiles Return: A Novel by Elisabeth de Waal. This book would never have come to my notice had it not been for Barry Cooper, the professor of political science at Calgary. Cooper has an insider’s understanding of a philosopher … Continue reading →

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Monthly Archives: December 2019

Book Matters

Book Matters

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