Tag Archives: seduction
Overheard at the Café
Overheard at the Café Among the rewards of my composing this column at the café where I’m what the French call an habituée, is that I get to overhear scenes from other people’s real lives. The café meets my need to … Continue reading
Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Action, Alienation, Anthropology, Art of Living, Autonomy, Biblical God, Chivalry, Class, conformism, Contemplation, Contradictions, Courtship, Cultural Politics, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Eternity, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, exploitation, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Freedom, Friendship, Gender Balance, Guilt and Innocence, hegemony, hidden God, hierarchy, history of ideas, ID, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Idolatry, Immorality, Institutional Power, Legal Responsibility, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Male Power, Masculinity, master/slave relation, Mind Control, Modernism, Moral action, Moral evaluation, Moral psychology, morality, novels, Ontology, Oppression, Past and Future, Poetry, Political Movements, politics of ideas, post modernism, Power, presence, promissory notes, Propaganda, Psychology, public facade, Reading, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, Romance, Romantic Love, Romanticism, scientism, secular, Seduction, self-deception, Sex Appeal, Sexuality, 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, twenty-first century, victimhood, victims, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged advice to a stranger, bad company, behind her back, café life, café seclusion, Carl Sandburg’s Cool Tombs, covering one’s tracks, divorce, divorce and status, eavesdropping, feminism and biology, feminism and culture, feminism and history, fidelity, French cafes, gossip, habituée, happy endings, male protector, marital complaints, my wife doesn’t understand me, painful truths, personal dignity, personal happiness, personal love, private conversation, rabbinic dictum, romantic story, scenes from life, scenes overheard, seducers approach, seduction, single woman, social costs, social disadvantage, social outranking, social ranking, social safety, solitary woman, the library of life, the lottery of life, the official story, tragic romance, woman without a man, women's liberation, worldly honors, writers in cafés, writing a column
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Sex, Honor and Philosophy
Plato wrote a dialogue, The Symposium, on this very topic. The setting is a drinking party held to celebrate the victory of one of the guests in a poetry contest. They go round the circle, each guest standing up to give a speech on the Great Question of the evening: What is love? Continue reading
Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Academe, Action, Afterlife, Alienation, American Politics, Anthropology, Art, Art of Living, Autonomy, beauty, Chivalry, Cities, Class, conformism, Contemplation, Contradictions, Cool, Courage, Courtship, cults, Cultural Politics, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Eternity, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, exploitation, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Freedom, Friendship, Gender Balance, glitterati, Guilt and Innocence, Health, hegemony, Heroes, hierarchy, History, history of ideas, ID, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Idolatry, Immorality, Immortality, Institutional Power, Legal Responsibility, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Male Power, Masculinity, master/slave relation, Medieval, Memoir, Mind Control, Modernism, Moral action, Moral evaluation, Moral psychology, Oppression, Past and Future, Peace, Philosophy, Poetry, Political, Political Movements, politics, politics of ideas, post modernism, Power, presence, promissory notes, Propaganda, Psychology, public facade, Public Intellectual, radicalism, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, Romance, Romantic Love, Romanticism, scientism, secular, Seduction, self-deception, Sex Appeal, Sexuality, 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, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, Violence, War, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged "Candid Camera", Alcibiades, ancient drinking party, ancient Greeks, austerity, blacklisting, breaking eggs, Camelot, celibacy, Diotima, disproportionate punishment, eros, eros and biology, eros and health, eros and memory, eros and politics, eros and the beautiful, eros and the good, eros of ambition, eros of social life, erotic disempowerment, erotic empowerment, erotic motives, erotic sin, holier-than-thou, injured pride, love object, love of wisdom, man/woman love, musicals, Parisian café, philosophic friendship, Plato, Plato's dialogues, Plato’s Symposium, pleasure, poetry contest, preserving femininity, preserving masculinity, professional death, professional honor, reparations, romantic speeches, Russian soul, safe space, same-sex love, seclusion, seduction, self-protection, sex and dominance, sex and revenge, sexual harassment, social change, soulmate, The Academy, the man/woman ratio, the mating game, the secret of love, The Symposium, transcendent perfection, virtue signaling, What is love?
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“Personality”
“Personality” More than once in these columns, I’ve mentioned my long-standing view that people live and die by ideas. Still, as I’ve come to recognize, that’s not entirely true. It has to be qualified. For example, it’s very hard to … Continue reading
Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Academe, Action, Alienation, Anthropology, Art, Art of Living, Atheism, Autonomy, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, Childhood, Chivalry, Christianity, Class, Contradictions, Cool, Courage, Courtship, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Freedom, Friendship, Gender Balance, Guilt and Innocence, Health, Hegel, Heroes, hidden God, History, history of ideas, ID, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Idolatry, Immorality, Institutional Power, Jews, Legal Responsibility, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Male Power, Masculinity, master, Memoir, memory, Messianic Age, Mind Control, Modernism, Mortality, Mysticism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, Ontology, Oppression, Past and Future, Peace, Phenomenology of Mind, Philosophy, Political, Political Movements, politics, Power, promissory notes, Propaganda, Psychology, public facade, Public Intellectual, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Renaissance, Roles, Romance, Romantic Love, Romanticism, Seduction, self-deception, Sex Appeal, Sexuality, slave, Social Conventions, Sociobiology, Spirituality, Suffering, Terror, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Men, The Problematic of Woman, Theism, Theology, Time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, Violence, War, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged 1907-1914, abdication, adultery, authoritarians, Aztecs, belief system, bluff, Carnival, Catholic authoritarians, Catholic mystics, childish taunting, Classical culture, conquest, conquest of Mexico, conquest of the Western hemisphere, consorts of powerful men, corrigibility, cultural conquest, cultural consensus, death wish, debates, descent, Donald Trump, European conquest of New World, female vulnerability, Feminism, Freud, gamesmanship, God-to-people partnership, Greco-Roman civilization, group consensus, Hebrew Scripture, ID, imprinting, infidelity, inherited belief, intellectual rivalry, intellectual self-correction, Jesuits, let-downs, libido, Life Force, male force, malice, man to man, marital cheating, morbid imprint, natural force, Nietzsche, night of passion, nineteenth century Europe, nineteenth century European women, one wild night, paganism, passion, personal imprint, personal magnetism, personal weak spots, personality, Political Campaign 2016, political debates, political games, political malice, power games, power of argument, power of ideas, power politics, powerful men, powerlessness of argument, pre-Columbian Mexico, Presidential Candidates 2016, Presidential debates, Presidential politics, primal force, primitive force, primitivity, refutation, rivals, Schopenhauer, secular humanism, seduction, social acceptance, suicide, TB, TB sanatorium, teasing, Terror, Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain, trophy wives, truth-seeking, United States of America, universal rights, untamed paganism, untamed personality, Walpurgis-Night, widowhood, winning debates, woman's autonomy, woman's freedom, womanhood, world progress, World War I
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“Philosophical Gossip”
“Philosophical Gossip” Not long ago, the writer Cynthia Ozick had a front page piece in the New York Times Book Review about gossip. In her usual talent-laden voice, Ozick wrestles with the double sense of gossip. Could it be deplorable … Continue reading
Posted in "Absolute Freedom and Terror", Absurdism, Academe, Action, Alienation, Anthropology, Art, Art of Living, Atheism, Autonomy, Bible, Childhood, Chivalry, Class, Contemplation, Contradictions, Cool, Courage, Courtship, Culture, Desire, dialectic, Erotic Life, Eternity, Ethics, Evil, Existentialism, Faith, Fashion, Femininity, Feminism, Films, Freedom, Friendship, Gender Balance, Guilt and Innocence, Heroes, hidden God, History, history of ideas, Idealism, Ideality, Identity, Ideology, Idolatry, Institutional Power, Jews, Journalism, Law, Legal Responsibility, life and death struggle, Literature, Love, Male Power, Martyrdom, Masculinity, master, Memoir, Mind Control, Modernism, Mortality, nineteenth-century, Oppression, Past and Future, Philosophy, Political, Political Movements, Power, Propaganda, Psychology, Public Intellectual, Reductionism, relationships, Religion, Roles, Seduction, Sex Appeal, Sexuality, slave, Social Conventions, Sociobiology, Spirituality, Suffering, Terror, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Men, The Problematic of Woman, Theism, Theology, Time, twentieth century, Violence, War, Work, Writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged "the evil tongue", "the few and the many", "the noble and the base", 19th century novels, Abigail L. Rosenthal's "Defining Evil Away: Arendt's Forgiveness", banality of evil, behaviorism, Bettina Stangneth's Eichmann Before Jerusalem: The Unexamined Life of a Mass Murderer, censorship, charisma, clandestine romance, classical philosophers, colleagues, collegiality, conventional religion, courtship, Cynthia Ozick, Cynthia Ozick's "The Novel's Evil Tongue", de-Nazification, dominance and submission, dramatic lives, eavesdropping, Eichmann trial transcript, emigres, evil as conformism, female vulnerability, Femininity, fiction, flattery, free will, freedom, German-Jewish philosophers, German-Jewish students, gossip, Hannah Arendt, Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, Hans Jonas Memoirs, Hans Jonas The Gnostic Religion, Henry James, historical characters, Jane Austen, lashon hara, Leo Strauss, Leo Strauss' Persecution and the Art of Writing, Letters 1925-1975: Hannah Arendt and Martin Heidegger, lifelong love affair, lifelong romance, love letter, Male Power, malice, Martin Heidegger, modern sensibility, Modernity, moral choice, narrative, novelists, Orthodox Judaism, persecution, persona, personal magnetism, personal v political, philosophers, philosophic friendships, philosophic lives, philosophic romances, Philosophy v Religion, plot lines, private passion, private persons, professorial power, public intellectuals, public v private, refugees, seduction, slander, Stanley Rosen, Tarzan and Jane, The Nazi Party, The New York Times Book Review, theologians, Tolstoy, University of Chicago, unpretentiousness, whitewashing, World War II
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“Dante’s Lovers”
“Dante’s Lovers” There is a circle of hell, not very far down but definitely under the white line of redemption, where Dante places a certain species of doomed lover. There the enchanted couples pursue each other and, it seems, are … Continue reading
Posted in Alienation, Chivalry, Courtship, Culture, Desire, Erotic Life, Evil, Faith, Femininity, Gender Balance, Guilt and Innocence, Identity, Idolatry, Literature, Love, Male Power, Memoir, Poetry, Power, Psychology, relationships, Roles, Seduction, Sex Appeal, slave, Spirituality, Suffering, The Examined Life, The Problematic of Woman, Theism, Time, twentieth century, Zeitgeist
Tagged "getting religion", "Lydia", "Now Voyager", "Ode on a Grecian Urn", addiction, attraction, Bette Davis, blind devotion, courtship, cynicism, Dante, doomed lovers, Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta, fulfillment, hell, hope, idyll, infatuation, John Keats, longing, lust, Merle Oberon, projection, romantic fantasy, sacrificial love, scorned lovers, second circle, seduction, self-deception, tease, unrequited love
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