Alexander Nehamas's Blog, page 11

Nehamas, Alexander : 4. Nietzsche And “Hitler”

In Robert S. Wistrich & Jacob Golomb (eds.), _ Nietzsche, Godfather of Fascism?: On the Uses and Abuses of a Philosophy _. Princeton University Press 90-106. 2009

Nehamas, Alexander : The Art of Living: Socratic Reflections From Plato to Foucault

For much of its history, philosophy was not merely a theoretical discipline but a way of life, an "art of living." This practical aspect of philosophy has been much less dominant in modernity than it was in ancient Greece and Rome, when philosophers of all stripes kept returning to Socrates as a model for living. The idea of philosophy as an art of living has survived in the works of such major modern authors as Montaigne, Nietzsche, and Foucault. Each of these writers has used philosophical discussion as a means of establishing what a person is and how a worthwhile life is to be lived. In this wide-ranging, brilliantly written account, Alexander Nehamas provides an incisive reevaluation of Socrates' place in the Western philosophical tradition and shows the importance of Socrates for Montaigne, Nietzsche, and Foucault. Why does each of these philosophers—each fundamentally concerned with his own originality—return to Socrates as a model? The answer lies in the irony that characterizes the Socrates we know from the Platonic dialogues. Socratic irony creates a mask that prevents a view of what lies behind. How Socrates led the life he did, what enabled or inspired him, is never made evident. No tenets are proposed. Socrates remains a silent and ambiguous character, forcing readers to come to their own conclusions about the art of life. This, Nehamas shows, is what allowed Montaigne, Nietzsche, and Foucault to return to Socrates as a model without thereby compelling them to imitate him. This highly readable, erudite study argues for the importance of the tradition within Western philosophy that is best described as "the art of living" and casts Montaigne, Nietzsche, and Foucault as the three major modern representatives of this tradition. Full of original ideas and challenging associations, this work will offer new ways of thinking about the philosophers Nehamas discusses and about the discipline of philosophy itself

Nehamas, Alexander : Is Living an Art that Can be Taught?

_Journal of Philosophical Research_ 40 (9999):81-91. 2015 (direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : Did Nietzsche hold a “Falsification Thesis”?

_Philosophical Inquiry_ 39 (1):222-236. 2015 (direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : Virtues of Authenticity, Essays on Plato and Socrates

_Philosophical Inquiry_ 32 (1-2):127-130. 2010 (direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : Una introducción al simposio de platón

_Ideas Y Valores_ 59 (143):189-205. 2010 (direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : The Good of Friendship

_Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society_ 110 (3pt3):267-294. 2010 Problems with representing friendship in painting and the novel and its more successful displays in drama reflect the fact that friends seldom act as inspiringly as traditional images of the relationship suggest: friends' activities are often trivial, commonplace and boring, sometimes even criminal. Despite all that, the philosophical tradition has generally considered friendship a moral good. I argue that it is not a moral good, but a good nonetheless. It provides opportunities to try different ways of being, and is crucial to the processes through which we establish our individuality(direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : Reply to Korsmeyer and Gaut

_British Journal of Aesthetics_ 50 (2):205-207. 2010 (No abstract is available for this citation)(direct link)

Nehamas, Alexander : Aristotelian Philia, Modern Friendship

_Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy_ 39:213 - 248. 2010

Nehamas, A. : Nietzsche, Psychology, and First Philosophy

_Common Knowledge_ 18 (2):361-362. 2012 Friedrich Nietzsche is one of the most elusive thinkers in the philosophical tradition. His highly unusual style and insistence on what remains hidden or unsaid in his writing make pinning him to a particular position tricky. Nonetheless, certain readings of his work have become standard and influential. In this major new interpretation of Nietzsche’s work, Robert B. Pippin challenges various traditional views of Nietzsche, taking him at his word when he says that his writing can best be understood as a kind of psychology.Pippin traces this idea of Nietzsche as a psychologist to his admiration for the French moralists: La Rochefoucauld, Pascal, Stendhal, and especially Montaigne. In distinction from philosophers, Pippin shows, these writers avoided grand metaphysical theories in favor of reflections on life as lived and experienced. Aligning himself with this project, Nietzsche sought to make psychology “the queen of the sciences” and the “path to the fundamental problems.” Pippin contends that Nietzsche’s singular prose was an essential part of this goal, and so he organizes the book around four of Nietzsche’s most important images and metaphors: that truth could be a woman, that a science could be gay, that God could have died, and that an agent is as much one with his act as lightning is with its flash.Expanded from a series of lectures Pippin delivered at the Collège de France, Nietzsche, Psychology, and First Philosophy offers a brilliant, novel, and accessible reading of this seminal thinker(direct link)