Download or read book Ironic Life written by Richard J. Bernstein and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2018-03-15 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Just as philosophy begins with doubt, so also a life that may be called human begins with irony" so wrote Kierkegaard. While we commonly think of irony as a figure of speech where someone says one thing and means the opposite, the concept of irony has long played a more fundamental role in the tradition of philosophy, a role that goes back to Socrates Ð the originator and exemplar of the urbane ironic life. But what precisely is Socratic irony and what relevance, if any, does it have for us today? Bernstein begins his inquiry with a critical examination of the work of two contemporary philosophers for whom irony is vital: Jonathan Lear and Richard Rorty. Despite their sharp differences, Bernstein argues that they complement one other, each exploring different aspects of ironic life. In the background of Lear’s and Rorty’s accounts stand the two great ironists: Socrates and Kierkegaard. Focusing on the competing interpretations of Socratic irony by Gregory Vlastos and Alexander Nehamas, Bernstein shows how they further develop our understanding of irony as a form of life and as an art of living. Bernstein also develops a distinctive interpretation of Kierkegaard’s famous claim that a life that may be called human begins with irony. Bernstein weaves together the insights of these thinkers to show how each contributes to a richer understanding of ironic life. He also argues that the emphasis on irony helps to restore the balance between two different philosophical traditions philosophy as a theoretical discipline concerned with getting things right and philosophy as a practical discipline that shapes how we ought to live our lives.
Download or read book The Irony of Life written by Henryk Sienkiewicz and published by Poole. This book was released on 1900 with total page 598 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Case for Irony written by Jonathan Lear and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2011-10-24 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2001, Vanity Fair declared that the Age of Irony was over. Joan Didion has lamented that the United States in the era of Barack Obama has become an "irony-free zone." Jonathan Lear in his 2006 book Radical Hope looked into America’s heart to ask how might we dispose ourselves if we came to feel our way of life was coming to an end. Here, he mobilizes a squad of philosophers and a psychoanalyst to once again forge a radical way forward, by arguing that no genuinely human life is possible without irony. Becoming human should not be taken for granted, Lear writes. It is something we accomplish, something we get the hang of, and like Kierkegaard and Plato, Lear claims that irony is one of the essential tools we use to do this. For Lear and the participants in his Socratic dialogue, irony is not about being cool and detached like a player in a Woody Allen film. That, as Johannes Climacus, one of Kierkegaard’s pseudonymous authors, puts it, “is something only assistant professors assume.” Instead, it is a renewed commitment to living seriously, to experiencing every disruption that shakes us out of our habitual ways of tuning out of life, with all its vicissitudes. While many over the centuries have argued differently, Lear claims that our feelings and desires tend toward order, a structure that irony shakes us into seeing. Lear’s exchanges with his interlocutors strengthen his claims, while his experiences as a practicing psychoanalyst bring an emotionally gripping dimension to what is at stake—the psychic costs and benefits of living with irony.
Download or read book The Rose Society written by Marie Lu and published by G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers. This book was released on 2015-10-13 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Vengeful in the aftermath of cruel betrayals by both family and friends, Adelina flees with her sister to build an army of fellow Young Elites in an effort to strike down the white-cloaked Inquisition Axis soldiers who nearly killed her.
Download or read book The Irony of American History written by Reinhold Niebuhr and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-01-22 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “[Niebuhr] is one of my favorite philosophers. I take away [from his works] the compelling idea that there’s serious evil in the world, and hardship and pain. And we should be humble and modest in our belief we can eliminate those things. But we shouldn’t use that as an excuse for cynicism and inaction. I take away . . . the sense we have to make these efforts knowing they are hard.”—President Barack Obama Forged during the tumultuous but triumphant postwar years when America came of age as a world power, The Irony of American History is more relevant now than ever before. Cited by politicians as diverse as Hillary Clinton and John McCain, Niebuhr’s masterpiece on the incongruity between personal ideals and political reality is both an indictment of American moral complacency and a warning against the arrogance of virtue. Impassioned, eloquent, and deeply perceptive, Niebuhr’s wisdom will cause readers to rethink their assumptions about right and wrong, war and peace. “The supreme American theologian of the twentieth century.”—Arthur Schlesinger Jr., New York Times “Niebuhr is important for the left today precisely because he warned about America’s tendency—including the left’s tendency—to do bad things in the name of idealism. His thought offers a much better understanding of where the Bush administration went wrong in Iraq.”—Kevin Mattson, The Good Society “Irony provides the master key to understanding the myths and delusions that underpin American statecraft. . . . The most important book ever written on US foreign policy.”—Andrew J. Bacevich, from the Introduction
Download or read book The Big Book of Irony written by Jon Winokur and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2013-12-10 with total page 149 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jon Winokur defines and classifies irony and contrasts it with coincidence and cynicism, and other oft-confused concepts that many think are ironic. He looks at the different forms irony can take, from an irony deficiency to visual irony to an understatement, using photographs and relate-able examples from pop culture. * "Irony in Action" looks at irony in language, both verbal and visual, while "Bastions of Irony" and "Masters of Irony" look at institutions and individuals steeped in irony, though not always intentionally. PLUS: * The Annals of Irony looks at irony, and its lack thereof, throughout history. A delight for anyone with a smart, dark sense of humor.
Download or read book Elixir Saved written by Katie L. Carroll and published by Shimmer Publications. This book was released on 2020-07-14 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Three lives saved by the Elixir; three lives bound by it. The Elixir entwines the lives of those it touches. Once upon a time, Kylene, Zelenka, and Devon tasted it and escaped death. None were left without scars. Now, a shocking message from the Ice Queen—one of Mother Nature’s higher beings—sends each survivor on a quest. Kylene travels to the frozen depths of Blanchardwood, Zelenka heads back to the wilds of Faway Forest, and Devon journeys to a reclusive mountain temple. The three paths converge in a war against an ancient and tricky foe. And even the Elixir cannot save everyone. The fate of the world balances on the edge of a sword, and the outcome depends on whether the survivors will sacrifice their second chances. Escape back into the world of the Great Peninsula in this much-anticipated sequel to the award-winning ELIXIR BOUND. Perfect for fans of the Thrones of Glass series by Sarah J. Maas.
Download or read book The Meaning of Irony written by Frank Stringfellow Jr. and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 1994-07-01 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Genuinely interdisciplinary in approach, The Meaning of Irony brings together literary analysis and, from psychoanalysis, both theory and case studies. Its investigation ranges from everyday examples of verbal irony—conscious and unconscious—to the complex irony of literature. This book provides the first full account of verbal irony from a psychoanalytic point of view. Stringfellow shows how the rhetorical tradition, by viewing the literal level of irony as something the speaker doesn't really mean, flattens out the rich ambiguities of irony and misses the unconscious meanings that are hidden behind ironic statement. He argues that only psychoanalysis can recover these unconscious meanings and reveal the origins of irony.
Download or read book Have You Ever Noticed written by Joe Moore and published by . This book was released on 1985 with total page 100 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Irony of Modern Catholic History written by George Weigel and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2019-09-17 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A powerful new interpretation of Catholicism's dramatic encounter with modernity, by one of America's leading intellectuals Throughout much of the nineteenth century, both secular and Catholic leaders assumed that the Church and the modern world were locked in a battle to the death. The triumph of modernity would not only finish the Church as a consequential player in world history; it would also lead to the death of religious conviction. But today, the Catholic Church is far more vital and consequential than it was 150 years ago. Ironically, in confronting modernity, the Catholic Church rediscovered its evangelical essence. In the process, Catholicism developed intellectual tools capable of rescuing the imperiled modern project. A richly rendered, deeply learned, and powerfully argued account of two centuries of profound change in the church and the world, The Irony of Modern Catholic History reveals how Catholicism offers twenty-first century essential truths for our survival and flourishing.
Download or read book The Ironic Hume written by John Valdimir Price and published by University of Texas Press. This book was released on 2014-08-04 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many of the seemingly bland assertions and bald statements of the eighteenth-century philosopher David Hume contain more than the mind immediately perceives. Author John Valdimir Price contends that an understanding of Hume's writings cannot be separated from an understanding of his life. By examining the works of Hume, Price shows the way in which an ironic way of seeing events and an ironic mode of expression permeated Hume's life and writings. Price examines Hume's irony as it is exhibited in letters to his friends and in his writings concerned with morality, people, philosophy, politics, history, and above all religion. Hume's opinions on life in general are stated in works ranging from the Treatise of Human Nature and the Essays, Moral and Political, through the Enquiry concerning Human Understanding and the Enquiry concerning Principles of Morals, to the Dialogue and Four Dissertations of his maturity. Price feels that Hume's recognition of the ironic in life came about from his perception of the disproportion between human hopes and human accomplishments. The rhetorical consequences of applying reason to a duality in human nature creates the ironic mode. Hume conceived man's opposing tendencies as his willingness to commit himself orally to a concept, a dogma, an idea, or an ideology, and his unwillingness to involve himself in the logical and rhetorical implications of articulating those principles. Hume's use of the ironic mode in his writings provides him with a means of challenging certain dogmatic assumptions common to thought, particularly to traditional religious thought; it acts as a mask for his sceptical intentions, and it is an implied criticism of many ideas. In his political writing, Hume frequently implied that the question under argument was almost too ridiculous to deserve serious treatment. This tactic was effectively employed in the Account of Stewart, in which Hume came to the defense of a friend. In his most profitable venture, the History of England, Hume not only used irony to advantage, but developed a new approach to the writing of history—the use of narrative. He presented history as a series of more or less connected events, not as a series of "right" or "wrong" attitudes. The author believes that Hume's initial religious scepticism, combined with the predominant satiric-ironic mode in the literature of his time, led him to seek irony as a method of self expression. This scepticism, which permeated all of Hume's attitudes toward life, reached its most complete expression in the Dialogues concerning Natural Religion, which accepted reason as its guide, but also accepted experience as its master.
Download or read book Daily Afflictions written by Andrew Boyd and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2002 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revolutionizing a bestselling genre, this thinking man's parody hijacks the format of "daily affirmations" by offering "daily afflictions" to give readers inspiration, practical advice, and food for thought.
Download or read book Irony and Sarcasm written by Roger Kreuz and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2020-02-18 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A biography of two troublesome words. Isn't it ironic? Or is it? Never mind, I'm just being sarcastic (or am I?). Irony and sarcasm are two of the most misused, misapplied, and misunderstood words in our conversational lexicon. In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, psycholinguist Roger Kreuz offers an enlightening and concise overview of the life and times of these two terms, mapping their evolution from Greek philosophy and Roman rhetoric to modern literary criticism to emojis. Kreuz describes eight different ways that irony has been used through the centuries, proceeding from Socratic to dramatic to cosmic irony. He explains that verbal irony—irony as it is traditionally understood—refers to statements that mean something different (frequently the opposite) of what is literally intended, and defines sarcasm as a type of verbal irony. Kreuz outlines the prerequisites for irony and sarcasm (one of which is a shared frame of reference); clarifies what irony is not (coincidence, paradox, satire) and what it can be (among other things, a socially acceptable way to express hostility); recounts ways that people can signal their ironic intentions; and considers the difficulties of online irony. Finally, he wonders if, because irony refers to so many different phenomena, people may gradually stop using the word, with sarcasm taking over its verbal duties.
Download or read book Kierkegaard s Writings written by Søren Kierkegaard and published by . This book was released on 1978 with total page 652 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Rhetoric of Irony written by Wayne C. Booth and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1974 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Perhaps no other critical label has been made to cover more ground than "irony," and in our time irony has come to have so many meanings that by itself it means almost nothing. In this work, Wayne C. Booth cuts through the resulting confusions by analyzing how we manage to share quite specific ironies—and why we often fail when we try to do so. How does a reader or listener recognize the kind of statement which requires him to reject its "clear" and "obvious" meaning? And how does any reader know where to stop, once he has embarked on the hazardous and exhilarating path of rejecting "what the words say" and reconstructing "what the author means"? In the first and longer part of his work, Booth deals with the workings of what he calls "stable irony," irony with a clear rhetorical intent. He then turns to intended instabilities—ironies that resist interpretation and finally lead to the "infinite absolute negativities" that have obsessed criticism since the Romantic period. Professor Booth is always ironically aware that no one can fathom the unfathomable. But by looking closely at unstable ironists like Samuel Becket, he shows that at least some of our commonplaces about meaninglessness require revision. Finally, he explores—with the help of Plato—the wry paradoxes that threaten any uncompromising assertion that all assertion can be undermined by the spirit of irony.
Download or read book Irony written by Theophilus Nicholson and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2017-04-21 with total page 175 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are moments in life when we discover the fallacies in some prior teachings we have received. Such moments, tend to lay caution to youthful idealism and are replaced by new realities. These realities may rattle the foundations of our ideological and spiritual underpinning, but, they still enter our lives and minds without fail.
Download or read book Mahabharat s Stories written by Seema Bharti and published by . This book was released on 2018-06-15 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I travel with time back and forth I witness the rise and fall of kings Humans become big and small with their deeds irrespective of their birth What is created is bound to perish with time All is left behind are lessons to be learnt. Pandavs are a set of five step-brothers married to the same woman, Draupadi. She is the most powerful female character and becomes the pivot point of the battle. The brothers are led by Arjun, who is one of them. Krishna is the mentor who grooms his protégé Arjun for the battle against injustice. While Arjun is reluctant and guilt ridden to fight relations for the sake of a kingdom, Krishna explains to him his duty as a warrior and human being.
