Category Archives: masculinity

“My Inescapable Femininity”

Sylvia Plath 1932-1963 Sylvia Plath is one writer I never wanted to read – partly because she seemed to have a “cult” following. My reluctance had, however, another motive: I don’t like to visit the lives or the works of … Continue reading

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One of a Kind

David Stove was a philosopher of the not-cut-to pattern kind. (Is that a kind? Just how many are there?) For example, he did not hesitate to kick the seemingly unassailable Charles Darwin in the shins for a train of errors … Continue reading

Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, anthropology, appreciation, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, chivalry, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, eighteenth century, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, journalism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, ontology, oppression, past and future, philosophy, poetry, political movements, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, self-deception, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

What Was the Woman Question?

Freud asked, “What does woman want?” It’s a good question, and let’s credit him with sincerely wanting to know. Even if his answers weren’t that good, such questions remain credible. When you ask that question of anybody, and want a … Continue reading

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What Kind of a Man?

I grew up on Manhattan’s Upper East Side (in the days before that got to be a swank neighborhood) and, aside from Mr. Z (our superintendent who turned out to be a Nazi spy), nobody – rich or poor or … Continue reading

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Peterhouse Meets Abbie

Peterhouse was founded in 1284 which makes it the oldest of the colleges in Cambridge University. A “college” provides a residence for students going for degrees at various levels and also for Fellows and other instructors who will be available … Continue reading

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Mystical Merger and Me

Once childhood’s unproblematic days were gone forever, I had to face the question of how to orient myself as a young girl. For some, as I gathered from pamphlets with titles like “Growing Up and Liking It” — that particular … Continue reading

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Where Are the Ex-Friends Now?

This is a week when I’ve been thinking about old friends who are, as it happens, ex-friends. Maybe it’s a special category of friendship.  I’ve devoted a recent column to David, who was a valued philosophical colleague. Together we shared … Continue reading

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A Good Look at an Old Evil

The title of this column plays off my first book, A Good Look at Evil. There I revisited some of the main philosophical ways of understanding evil before I offered my own view, exhibiting its power to illuminate a wide … Continue reading

Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, 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, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Ave Atque Vale (Hail and Farewell)

The other day I scanned the internet for news of ex-friends who’d stayed significant in my memory. “We quarreled,” as French philosopher Sartre said about one former friend, the philosopher Merleau-Ponty, “a quarrel does not matter. It’s just one more … Continue reading

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When the Stones Speak

Doran Spielman’s When the Stones Speak: The Remarkable Discovery of the City of David Is the Bible a history book? Did the stories in it (or some of the more literal-sounding ones) really happen? Or are we modern people obliged … Continue reading

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