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Tessa is a successful writer who develops a friendship, first by correspondence and then in person, with Charlie, a ruggedly handsome philosopher and scholar. Sparks fly as they exchange ideas about Camus and masculine desire, and their intellectual connection promises more - but there are obstacles to this burgeoning relationship. While Tessa's husband Milton enjoys Charlie's company, Charlie's wife Wah is a different case, and she proves to be both adversary and conundrum to Tessa. Wah's traditional femininity and subservience to her husband strike Tessa as weaknesses, and she scoffs at the sacrifices Wah makes as adoptive mother to a Burmese girl, Htet. But Wah has a kind of power too, especially over Charlie, and the conflict between the two women leads to Tessa's martini-fueled declaration that Wah is'an insult to womankind.'As Tessa is forced to deal with the consequences of her outburst, she wonders if Wah is really as weak as she has seemed, or if she might have a different kind of strength altogether. An exercise in empathy, an exploration of betrayal and a charged story of the thrill of a shared connection - and the perils of feminine rivalry - My Nemesis is a brilliantly dramatic and captivating story from a hugely talented writer.

The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is a brilliant fictional journey through Western political philosophy by one of our most original thinkers. Professor Caritat, a middle-aged Candide, walks naively through the neighbouring countries of Utilitaria, Communitaria and Libertaria, in his quest to find the best of all possible worlds. Cut loose from the confines of his ivory tower, this wandering professor is made to confront the perplexed state of modern thinking in this dazzling comedy of ideas.

Jiyan, un jeune philosophe rencontre un vieux sage. Leur conversation s'engage sous un vieux chêne centenaire et se poursuit en marchant dans la forêt. Evdal répond aux multiples interrogations de son jeune disciple, de manière bienveillante et inédite en lui racontant des contes philosophiques qu'il a inventés pour les hommes. Le jeune philosophe et le vieux sage écrit par l'auteur il y a 10 ans à son arrivée en France, se fait écho à cette enfance et reflète ce qui caractérise Mem Aydin : son goût pour la recherche d'une pensée juste et utile qu'il aime partager avec les autres. Réveille la philosophie qui est en toi!

Excerpt:'Considering our present advanced state of culture, and how the Torch of Science has now been brandished and borne about, with more or less effect, for five thousand years and upwards; how, in these times especially, not only the Torch still burns, and perhaps more fiercely than ever, but innumerable Rushlights, and Sulphur-matches, kindled thereat, are also glancing in every direction, so that not the smallest cranny or dog-hole in Nature or Art can remain unilluminated,—it might strike the reflective mind with some surprise that hitherto little or nothing of a fundamental character, whether in the way of Philosophy or History, has been written on the subject of Clothes.'

The new historical thriller featuring Giordano Bruno—heretic, philosopher, and spy— which finds Bruno going undercover to prevent an assassination plot on Queen Elizabeth.England, 1586. A treasonous conspiracy... Giordano Bruno, a heretic turned spy, arrives in England with shocking information for spymaster Sir Francis Walsingham. A band of Catholic Englishmen are plotting to kill Queen Elizabeth and spring Mary Queen of Scots from prison to take the English throne in her place. A deadly trap... Bruno is surprised to find that Walsingham is aware of the plot—led by the young, wealthy noble Anthony Babington—and is allowing it to progress. He hopes that Mary will put her support in writing—and condemn herself to a traitor's death. A queen in mortal danger... Bruno is tasked with going undercover to join the conspirators. Can he stop them before he is exposed? Either way a queen will die; Bruno must make sure it is the right one.

'Wit and humour — a real piece of Turkish delight.'— BBCNuri Iskirlak, the esteemed Turkish scholar and philosopher of Joan Fleming's Gold Dagger–winning mystery When I Grow Rich, returns for another tale of adventure and international intrigue. When Nuri is enlisted by an old flame to search for her son, a student at Oxford who's suddenly gone missing, he must once again neglect his studies to play detective. This time he ventures far from home, and upon his arrival in England, Nuri quickly realizes that he's headed for a cultural clash between East and West as well as another dangerous encounter with drug smugglers. An action-packed combination of mystery, detection, and suspense, Nothing Is the Number When You Die crackles with page-turning excitement.'One of the most delightful detective heroes in crime fiction.'— Sunday Times

(Excerpt):'A faithful and very surprising Account how Dickory Cronke, a Tinner's son, in the County of Cornwall, was born Dumb, and continued so for Fifty-eight years; and how, some days before he died, he came to his Speech; with Memoirs of his Life, and the Manner of his Death.'

Daniel Defoe is most well-known for his classic novels Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders. Born around 1660, he was also a journalist, a pamphleteer, a businessman, a spy. His life was long and colourful, and the breadth of his work, still highly regarded, is infused with similar vigour. It is said that only the bible has been printed in more languages than Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is also noted for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel. He was extremely prolific and a very versatile writer, producing several hundred books, pamphlets, and journals on various topics including politics, crime, religion, marriage, psychology and the supernatural. He was also a pioneer of economic journalism though was made bankrupt on more on one occasion and usually mired in debt. In later life Defoe was often most seen on Sundays when bailiffs and the like could legally make no move on him. Allegedly it was whilst hiding from creditors that he died on April 24th, 1731. He was interred in Bunhill Fields, London.

Fitzroy kämpft: gegen das eigene Schwergewicht und das der Welt, gegen den inneren Schweinehund, gegen die allgemeine Verblödung – und überhaupt. Denn Professor Dr. Egidius Fitzroy ist Philosoph, freischaffender, ja freischwebender Philosoph. In seiner Philosophischen Praxis berät er Menschen, die sich mit Sinnfragen und Lebensproblemen an ihn wenden. Indem wir ihm dabei über die Schulter schauen, lernen wir nicht nur ihn, sondern auch etliche andere wunderliche Zeitgenossen kennen, wobei geistreiche Einfälle, witzige Sprüche und Schopenhauer'sche Lebensweisheit nicht zu kurz kommen. Doch dann muss Fitzroy Frankfurt verlassen, da die Internationale Schopenhauer Gesellschaft ihn zur Bewährung auf ein Kreuzfahrtschiff schickt. Nur wenig begeistert bricht er auf zu einer Seefahrt, die nicht nur lustig ist und die sein Leben verändern wird.

The title novella, “The Atheist in the Attic,” appearing here in book form for the first time, is a suspenseful and vivid historical narrative, recreating the top-secret meeting between the mathematical genius Leibniz and the philosopher Spinoza caught between the horrors of the cannibalistic Dutch Rampjaar and the brilliant “big bang” of the Enlightenment. Plus: equal parts history, confession, complaint, gossip, and personal triumph, Delany's “Racism and Science Fiction” combines scholarly research and personal experience in the unique true story of the first major African American author in the genre. And featuring: a bibliography, an author biography, and our candid, uncompromising, and customary Outspoken Interview.

Sartor Resartus is considered to be Scottish author Thomas Carlyle's greatest work. Heraklion Press has included a linked table of contents for easy navigation.

According to Wikipedia:'Thomas Carlyle's major work, Sartor Resartus (meaning'The tailor re-tailored'), first published as a serial in 1833-34, purported to be a commentary on the thought and early life of a German philosopher called Diogenes Teufelsdrockh (which translates as'god-born devil-dung'), author of a tome entitled'Clothes: their Origin and Influence.'Teufelsdrockh's Transcendentalist musings are mulled over by a skeptical English editor who also provides fragmentary biographical material on the philosopher. The work is, in part, a parody of Hegel, and of German Idealism more generally.'According to Wikipedia:'Thomas Carlyle (1795 – 1881) was a Scottish essayist, satirist, and historian, whose work was highly influential during the Victorian era. Coming from a strict Calvinist family, Carlyle was expected by his parents to become a preacher, but while at the University of Edinburgh, he lost his Christian faith. Calvinist values, however, remained with him throughout his life. This combination of a religious temperament with loss of faith in traditional Christianity made Carlyle's work appealing to many Victorians who were grappling with scientific and political changes that threatened the traditional social order.'

«Un insomne sabe que la cama es el lugar de las horas largas, del miedo, de la proximidad consigo mismo y con la muerte.» Novela ganadora del Premio Xavier Villaurrutia 2017. Hay hombres de apariencia pequeña que se vuelven grandes ante la arbitrariedad de la historia. Olegaroy es uno de ellos. Tras el salvaje asesinato de una joven, él decidirá tomar la investigación por su cuenta y en el proceso habrá de toparse con las dudas que más inquietan al ser humano desde que comenzó a reflexionar en la antigua Grecia. Por eso la humanidad tiene una deuda inmensurable con este preclaro pensador mexicano cuya vida, obra e ideas habrían quedado en el olvido de no ser por esta narración que, según los propios criterios olegarianos, es absolutamente verdadera. En este libro, David Toscana muestra que el sabio es un animal nocturno, pues cualquier verdad que desee revelar el cosmos, lo hará durante la noche, cuando la masa de mediocres está roncando. Ganadora del XI Premio Iberoamericano de Novela Elena Poniatowska. La crítica ha dicho... «Deseo que nunca lean a Toscana. La verdad es que no lo merecen. Que nos lo dejen a los bastardos, a los desamparados, a los miserables, a nosotros los bárbaros, los desafortunados.» Goodreads «Toscana se ha inventado una novela porque necesitaba escribir una crítica, recuerda como Nabokov, ambos estetas de la recepción, que el lector tiene siempre la última palabra, recrimina la frivolidad del sector editorial y denuncia sin ambages que en nuestro panorama literario sobra ruido y faltan nueces, y que mucha literatura no es digna de ese nombre.» Babelia, El País «David Toscana es el más original y disfrutable escritor de su generación.» El Observador «De página en página uno ve doble, ve triple, ve magia. Algunos tienen el alegre alcohol. Toscana posee la feliz imaginación. Inventa diez, veinte, cien novelas a partir de un descubrimiento macabro. ¡Rápido, queremos otra ronda!» Le Nouvel

One of the most famous victims of the Holy Office of the Inquisition was the brilliant Dominican monk Giordano Bruno, burnt at the stake for heresy in 1600. Morris West recreates a diary of Bruno's intimate thoughts as he languishes in Rome's worst prison for seven years. Bruno's reflections and frank memories of his life reveal him to be both a fine thinker and a flawed priest-and a man willing to pay the highest price to be true to himself. The Last Confession was West's final novel, published posthumously. Written with passion and compassion, this is a voice that mesmerises from the start.

The Travels of Ibn Fudayl is a satirical tale written in the style of an academic who has translated a medieval manuscript. It comes complete with a foreword, introduction, bibliography and copious footnotes that poke fun at the pretentious world of academia, whilst chronicling Ibn Fudayl's experiences in Al-Andalus. In particular, how his search for wisdom leads him to meet the philosopher Al-Homsi, the world's most ignorant man. It is their friendship and love for worthless knowledge that enables Ibn Fudayl to reach the upper echelons of Andalusian society.

Deacon Shader est un enfant hors du temps, enlevé bébé à ses parents de l'ancien monde et élevé sur l'île de Maranore. Le jour de ses sept ans, le philosophe Aristodeus arrive pour commencer l'entraînement du garçon sur deux plans : épée et esprit. Seule l'excellence est acceptable si Deacon doit remplir son destin et empêcher le déliement de toute chose. Mais alors qu'Aristodeus le pousse au-delà de ses limites, des pilleurs approchant la côte sont repérés et un nuage d'horreur descend sur le village. Car ce ne sont pas des pirates ordinaires : ils voguent sous la bannière de l'Homme Empalé, le sinistre pavillon de la Vérusia, la terre des morts-vivants et le royaume du Seigneur Liche.

Alone in New York, separated from his girlfriend by the Atlantic Ocean, the name-less narrator of Heinz Helle's electric debut novel is sinking slowly into crisis. He loves his girlfriend but finds himself attracted to every woman he sees. He is cursed with total self-awareness yet can't seem to control his actions. And his brain won't stop its whirring analysis of the world around him, second-guessing everything he thinks and says and does. Normal life - watching football with friends, drinking with work colleagues, being with his girlfriend - is becoming almost impossible to bear. As the narrator struggles with the everyday difficulties of existence, Superabundance asks: how do we live when our relationships, our actions and even our own minds are filled with such heartbreaking mystery?

Deacon Shader è un bambino esterno al tempo, portato via da neonato dai suoi genitori del mondo Antico e cresciuto sull'Isola di Maranore. Al suo settimo compleanno, il filosofo Aristodeus giunge per iniziare l'addestramento del ragazzo con la spada e con la mente. Solo l'eccellenza può essere abbastanza se Deacon vuole avverare il proprio destino ed evitare la Disfatta di tutte le cose. Ma mentre Aristodeus lo spinge verso i suoi limiti, vengono avvistati dei banditi avvicinarsi alla costa, e una nuvola di terrore scende sull'intero villaggio. Poiché questi non sono pirati normali. Navigano sotto lo stendardo dell'Uomo Impalato, l'orribile bandiera di Verusia, terra di non-morti e regno del Signore dei Lich.

Powieść noblisty Anatole'a France'a – wielkiego erudyty i bibliofila, o sprecyzowanych poglądach socjalistyczno-pacyfistycznych, którym dawał wyraz w swoich powieściach, tworząc światy głęboko przeniknięte humanizmem. Wątek obyczajowy dotyczący pana Bergereta, profesora nadzwyczajnego na wydziale humanistycznym, zanurzony jest w pogłębionej refleksji o sprawach społecznych i religijnych.

One of the most vital and pregnant books in our modern literature,'Sartor Resartus'is also, in structure and form, one of the most daringly original. It defies exact classification. It is not a philosophic treatise. It is not an autobiography. It is not a romance. Yet in a sense it is all these combined. Its underlying purpose is to expound in broad outline certain ideas which lay at the root of Carlyle's whole reading of life. But he does not elect to set these forth in regular methodic fashion, after the manner of one writing a systematic essay. He presents his philosophy in dramatic form and in a picturesque human setting. He invents a certain Herr Diogenes Teufelsdröckh, an erudite German professor of'Allerley-Wissenschaft,'or Things in General, in the University of Weissnichtwo, of whose colossal work,'Die Kleider, Ihr Werden und Wirken'(On Clothes: Their Origin and Influence), he represents himself as being only the student and interpreter. With infinite humour he explains how this prodigious volume came into his hands; how he was struck with amazement by its encyclopædic learning, and the depth and suggestiveness of its thought; and how he determined that it was his special mission to introduce its ideas to the British public. But how was this to be done? As a mere bald abstract of the original would never do, the would-be apostle was for a time in despair. But at length the happy thought occurred to him of combining a condensed statement of the main principles of the new philosophy with some account of the philosopher's life and character. Thus the work took the form of a'Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh,'and as such it was offered to the world. Here, of course, we reach the explanation of its fantastic title—'Sartor Resartus,'or the Tailor Patched: the tailor being the great German'Clothes-philosopher,'and the patching being done by Carlyle as his English editor...

Deacon Shader es un chico fuera del tiempo, separado de bebé de sus padres del mundo Antiguo y criado en la Isla de Maranore. En su séptimo cumpleaños, el filósofo Aristodeus llega para empezar el entrenamiento del chico con la espada y la mente. Nada menos que la excelencia será suficiente, si Deacon ha de cumplir su destino y evitar el Fin de todas las cosas. Pero mientras Aristodeus le lleva a sus límites, unos atracadores son vistos acercándose a la costa, y una nube de terror desciende sobre el pueblo. Puesto que no eran piratas ordinarios. Navegan bajo el Hombre Apuntalado, la espeluznante bandera de Verusia, tierra de los muertos vivientes y reino del Lord Liche.

A French philosopher dies during a savage summer heat wave. Boxes carrying his unpublished miscellany mysteriously appear in Simon Critchley's office. Rooting through piles of papers, Critchley discovers a brilliant text on the ancient art of memory and a cache of astrological charts predicting the deaths of various philosophers. Among them is a chart for Critchley himself, laying out in great detail the course of his life and eventual demise. Becoming obsessed with the details of his fate, Critchley receives the missing, final box, which contains a maquette of Giulio Camillo's sixteenth-century Venetian memory theatre, a space supposed to contain the sum of all knowledge. That's when the hallucinations begin...

From this renowned philosopher comes a debut work of fiction, at once a brilliant précis of the history of philosophy, a semiautobiographical meditation on the absurd relationship between knowledge and memory, and a very funny storyA French philosopher dies during a savage summer heat wave. Boxes carrying his unpublished papers mysteriously appear in Simon Critchley's office. Rooting through them, Critchley discovers a brilliant text on the ancient art of memory and a cache of astrological charts predicting the deaths of various philosophers. Among them is a chart for Critchley himself, laying out in great detail the course of his life and eventual demise. While waiting for his friend's prediction to come through, Critchley receives the missing, final box, which contains a maquette of Giulio Camillo's sixteenth-century Venetian memory theater, a space supposed to contain the sum of all knowledge. With nothing left to hope for, Critchley devotes himself to one final project before his death—the building of a structure to house his collective memories and document the remnants of his entire life.

Literally meaning'The tailor re-tailored,''Sartor Resartus'is Thomas Carlyle's 1836 novel which was first serialized in'Fraser's Magazine'in 1833-1834. The novel poses as a review for the work'Clothes, Their Origin and Influence'by the fictional philosopher Diogenes Teufelsdrockh, Professor of'Things in General'at Weissnichtwo University. Intended by Carlyle as a new kind of book,'Sartor Resartus'is at once a work of fiction and social philosophy that challenges the reader to determine what is truth and what is merely the invention of the author. The exploration of fashion through the fictional work discussed in the book exists as an allegory to explore the changing conventions of other elements of culture and society.'Sartor Resartus'marked an important transition from the Romantic and Victorian periods, whose influence on countless other literary figures cannot be understated.

The Philosopher's Stone assembles various narrative stands into a cohesive and thought-provoking tale of our times. The trenchant criticism of continuous self-optimization and esoteric ideology are astonishingly subtle and reward repeated reading.

In the Edgar Award–winning first title of the Niccolo Benedetti series, the celebrated detective hunts a serial killer who is terrorizing a small townIn the upstate New York town of Sparta, six people die in three weeks. At first the incidents seem accidental: A highway sign drops onto a car full of teenage girls, an old man falls down a set of stairs, and a boy is struck by a sheet of ice that had been building on his garage. But after each case a note turns up. Someone called “Hog” claims responsibility for each death, and taunts the police to catch him before he strikes again. The deaths have everybody talking, and the local police department is eventually forced to share the case with famous Italian detective Niccolo Benedetti and his protégé, would-be cop turned private investigator Ron Gresham. A painter, ladies'man, and rule-bending genius, Benedetti views every case as a chance to probe the nature of evil. And with his “analyze and imagine” method, he'll pursue the killer both to stop him and to study him.

A gripping historical thriller set in sixteenth-century England and centered on the highly secretive cult of Saint Thomas Becket, the twelfth-century archbishop murdered in Canterbury Cathedral. London, summer of 1584: Radical philosopher, ex-monk, and spy Giordano Bruno suspects he is being followed by an old enemy. He is shocked to discover that his pursuer is in fact Sophia Underhill, a young woman with whom he was once in love. When Bruno learns that Sophia has been accused of murdering her husband, a prominent magistrate in Canterbury, he agrees to do anything he can to help clear her name. In the city that was once England's greatest center of pilgrimage, Bruno begins to uncover unsuspected secrets that point to the dead man being part of a larger and more dangerous plot in the making. He must turn his detective's eye on history—on Saint Thomas Becket, the twelfth-century archbishop murdered in Canterbury Cathedral, and on the legend surrounding the disappearance of his body—in order to solve the crime. As Bruno's feelings for Sophia grow more intense, so does his fear that another murder is about to take place—perhaps his own. But more than Bruno's life is at stake in this vividly rendered, impeccably researched, and addictively page-turning whodunit—the stability of the kingdom hangs in the balance as Bruno hunts down a brutal murderer in the shadows of England's most ancient cathedral.

An electric thriller where spies go to battle, and the free world is at stakeIn the final installment in William DeAndrea's Clifford Driscoll series, master spy Driscoll is “going tame”—that is, recovering from a near-death accident and enjoying domestic peace. Driscoll, now known as Allan Trotter, hasn't killed anyone in more than a year. He still works for the Agency—a super-secret intelligence unit of the US government known only to the president and its founding congressman—but he's too full of pins and plates to be a field agent anymore. To top it off, he's so smitten with beautiful media mogul Regina Hudson that he's contemplating settling down. But Trotter's new life is rudely interrupted when he learns that Soviet spies are bent on taking charge of the upcoming US presidential election. Their instrument is an influential senator, Hank Van Horn, a womanizing bad seed who— despite an upstanding reputation—once murdered one of his own staffers. And as if the election plot wasn't perilous enough, Van Horn's relentless son, Mark, soon gets involved in a very bloody way.

Allan Trotter goes head to head with the Angel of DeathAllan Trotter's counter-espionage service began at birth: His father, the head of an ultra-secret intelligence wing of the US government, deliberately conceived him with a gorgeous Russian spy. Raised to navigate a crooked world, Trotter was immersed in deception, danger, and narrow escapes. He's a perfectly honed agent, but he desperately wants a normal life. Trotter is pulled out of his life of seclusion, though, when the Russian spy outfit Cronus sends their Angel of Death, Azreal, to a sleepy town in Upstate New York to knock off innocent people. The aim? To scare back a stray agent: Petra Hudson, now the happy CEO of a media conglomerate worth billions, who has put her spying past behind her—or so she thinks. Ignorant of her mother's double life, Hudson's daughter, Regina, a newspaper editor, has unknowingly alerted the Agency. And since fighting Cronus is the one thing that can give Trotter's life meaning, when he learns that Regina—a kindred victim of the organization—is at risk, the stakes feel even more crucial.

A onetime baseball catcher confronts the murder of a McCarthyist politician at Yankee StadiumIn 1953 America, McCarthyism is everywhere. Congressman Rex Harwood Simmons is among the leaders who single-mindedly hunt down suspected Communists; he even claims that Communism has infiltrated America's favorite pastime. But while watching a Yankee game one afternoon, he becomes a target. As the crowd cheers for a homerun, Simmons is shot dead in his seat. The task of solving the crime falls to onetime ballplayer and Korean War veteran Russ Garrett, who collaborates with “Vicious Aloysius” Murphy, a Bronx homicide detective. The investigation won't be easy, since there are plenty of people with a motive to plug Simmons. Several clues point to a blacklisted intellectual—but he was driven to suicide years ago. And as Garrett hunts for the killer, a new conspiracy comes to light: a plot to murder Yankee star Mickey Mantle.

'Mournful, insightful, and mystical...Mosley's best work of fiction.'—Elle New York Times bestselling author Walter Mosley introduces us to Socrates Fortlow, an'astonishing character'(Los Angeles Times Book Review) in this acclaimed collection of linked stories.'I either committed a crime or had a crime done to me every day I was in jail. Once you go to prison you belong there.'Socrates Fortlow has done his time: twenty-seven years for murder and rape, acts forged by his own two rock-breaking hands. Now, he has come home to a new kind of prison: two battered rooms in an abandoned building in Watts. Working a dead-end job at the supermarket and moving perilously close to invisibility, Socrates seeks inner truth and redemption amid the violence and hopelessness of South Central Los Angeles. In fourteen intertwining tales, Socrates grapples with situations that are never easy as he attempts to hold on to a job and offer a lifeline to a young man on his same bloodstained path. In Socrates's battle-scarred wisdom, there is hope of turning the world around in this'powerful, hard-hitting, unrelenting, poignant short fiction'(Booklist).

On a family sheep farm in the interior of Australia, a brother and sister work the land while their reclusive brother, Wesley Antill, spends years toiling away in one of the sheds, writing his philosophy. Having forsaken the family business to travel through European cities in search of a foundation,Wesley returned home to spend his days holed up to write his magnum opus, trying to invent a new philosophy, a “theory of the emotions.” But after his untimely death, his papers are left untouched in his study, to be handled posthumously by his siblings. They call on Erica Hazlehurst, a philosopher, to travel from Sydney to appraise Wesley's work to see if it is publishable. Accompanying her is her sexy and passionate friend, Sophie, a psychoanalyst who needs a distraction from a string of failed relationships. These two women, each with different views of the world and counter approaches to life, face a situation they have never experienced before, with surprising results. What begins as a spontaneous, brief sojourn will end up changing their lives. The Pages is a beguiling meditation on friendship and love, on men and women, on landscape and the difficulties of thought itself, by one of Australia's greatest novelists, the author of the much-loved Eucalyptus.

This “wicked, melancholy, and... astonishing” novel reimagines the lives of three wildly different men adrift in the 20th century: Ludwig Wittgenstein, Bertrand Russell, and G. E. Moore (Newsday). When Bruce Duffy's The World As I Found It was first published, critics and readers were bowled over by its daring reimagining of the lives of three very different men, the philosophers Bertrand Russell, G. E. Moore, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. A brilliant group portrait with the vertiginous displacements of twentieth-century life looming large in the background, Duffy's novel depicts times and places as various as Vienna 1900, the trenches of World War I, Bloomsbury, and the colleges of Cambridge, while the complicated main characters appear not only in thought and dispute but in love and despair. Wittgenstein, a strange, troubled, and troubling man of gnawing contradictions, is at the center of a novel that reminds us that the apparently abstract and formal questions that animate philosophy are nothing less than the intractable matters of life and death.

Susannah's official boyfriend, Jason, is the perfect foil for her student lifestyle. He is ten years older, an antiques dealer, and owns a stylish apartment that prevents her from having to live in the seedy digs on campus. This way, she can take her philosophy major very seriously and dabble in the social and sexual freedom of 1970s university life. But circumstances become more complicated than Susannah would like when she begins to have an affair with her tutorial partner, Rob. Soon she is dating two men, missing her lectures, exploring independence and feminism with her girlfriends, and finding herself in a particularly impossible dilemma: she becomes pregnant. Forced to look beyond her friends and lovers for support, she finds help and inspiration from the lessons of Kierkegaard and other European philosophers.A Girl's Guide to Modern European Philosophy is a delightfully insightful, bittersweet coming-of-age romp, in which love is far from platonic and the mind—body predicament a pressing reality. It even succeeds where many introductions to philosophy have failed, by effortlessly bringing to life the central tenets of the most important European philosophers of modern times.

It is 1967. In separate wings of a Viennese hospital, two men lie bedridden. The narrator, named Thomas Bernhard, is stricken with a lung ailment; his friend Paul, nephew of the celebrated philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, is suffering from one of his periodic bouts of madness. As their once-casual friendship quickens, these two eccentric men begin to discover in each other a possible antidote to their feelings of hopelessness and mortality—a spiritual symmetry forged by their shared passion for music, strange sense of humor, disgust for bourgeois Vienna, and great fear in the face of death. Part memoir, part fiction, Wittgenstein's Nephew is both a meditation on the artist's struggle to maintain a solid foothold in a world gone incomprehensibly askew, and a stunning—if not haunting—eulogy to a real-life friendship.

From New York Times bestselling author Walter Mosley, the third collection of Socrates Fortlow tales,'a thought-provoking exploration of wickedness—and what's to be done about it'(Seattle Times). Living in south central L.A., Socrates Fortlow is a sixty-year-old ex-convict still strong enough to kill men with his bare hands. Filled with profound guilt about his own crimes and disheartened by the chaos of the streets, Socrates calls together local people of all races and social stations and begins to conduct a Thinkers'Club, where all can discuss life's unanswerable questions. Infiltrated by undercover cops and threatened by strain from within, the Thinkers'Club doesn't have it easy. But simply by debating racial authenticity, street justice, and the possibility of mutual understanding, Socrates and his unlikely crew actually begin to make a difference. The Right Mistake is Walter Mosley at his most incisive. In turns outraged and affectionate, it offers a profoundly literary and ultimately redemptive exploration of the possibility of moral action in a violent world.

An unforgettable novel about a man's search for meaning.

From the imagination of one of the most brilliant writers of our time and bestselling author of The Life of Thomas More, a novel that playfully imagines how the'modern'era might appear to a thinker seventeen centuries hence.At the turn of the 38th century, London's greatest orator, Plato, is known for his lectures on the long, tumultuous history of his now tranquil city. Plato focuses on the obscure and confusing era that began in A.D. 1500, the Age of Mouldwarp. His subjects include Sigmund Freud's comic masterpiece'Jokes and Their Relation to the Subconscious,'and Charles D.'s greatest novel,'The Origin of Species.'He explores the rituals of Mouldwarp, and the later cult of webs and nets that enslaved the population. By the end of his lecture series, however, Plato has been drawn closer to the subject of his fascination than he could ever have anticipated. At once funny and erudite, The Plato Papers is a smart and entertaining look at how the future is imagined, the present absorbed, and the past misrepresented.

Socrates Fortlow, an ex-convict forced to define his own morality in a lawless world, confronts wrongs that most people would rather ignore and comes face-to-face with the most dangerous emotion: hope. It has been nine years since his release from prison, and he still makes his home in a two-room shack in a Watts alley. But he has a girlfriend now, a steady job, and he is even caring for a pet, the two-legged dog he calls Killer. These responsibilities make finding the right path even harder - especially when the police make Socrates their first suspect in every crime within six blocks.--BOOK JACKET.'In each chapter of Walkin'the Dog, Socrates challenges a different conundrum of modern life. In'Blue Lightning,'he is offered a better-paying job but has to consider whether the extra pay is worth the freedom he would have to give up. In'Promise,'he keeps a vow made long ago to a dying friend, and learns that a promise to one person can mean damage to another. In'Mookie Kid,'he gets a telephone and,learns that the price of being able to reach others is that others can contact him - whether he wants to be reached or not.'--BOOK JACKET.'Walkin'the Dog builds to a stunning climax as Socrates takes on a rogue cop who has terrorized his neighborhood.'--BOOK JACKET.

This historical-biographical novel fleshes out the facts of Nietzsche's life with fictional treatment. Using untraditional narrative techniques and interweaving medical reports, actual letters, and original new text, the novel takes the last years of Nietzsche's life, the years of insanity, as a frame for the entire life.Krell offers a fictional account of the last ten years of Nietzsche's life, the years of his paralysis and madness. Nietzsche's regression during those years, from one of Europe's leading intellectual lights to a passive mascot for his sister's'Nietzsche Archive,'provides the frame for a narrative of his entire life.The author uses all the available medical documentation and the entire collection of works and letters in order to paint his portrait. While Nietzsche has been the object of several attempts at fictional biography, no attempt to date has been based on such careful research: even the highest flights of imagination in this work are based on scrupulous reading and reflection.David Farrell Krell is Professor of Philosophy at DePaul University. His most recent books include Lunar Voices: Of Tragedy, Poetry, Fiction, and Thought; Daimon Life: Heidegger and Life-Philosophy,/i>; and Memory, Reminiscence, and Writing: On the Verge.

Aleesa and Kenneth think people who lived long ago have nothing to do with what's going on today until they meet Socrates during the trial for his life.