Matthew Coniam says that Groundhog Day explains existentialism more entertainingly than Sartre. Groundhog Day (1993) was one of the most critically acclaimed and popular American film comedies of the nineteen-nineties, admired both for its warm-hearted romance and for the delightful comic absurdity of its central premise. In this article I aim to show that it …
More than any other recent philosophical movement, the existentialists communicated their ideas through plays, novels and short stories. Peter Rickman asks: why did existentialism resort to literary expression? Jean-Paul Sartre was a professional philosopher who taught the subject and wrote substantial works on it. However he also wrote, and is widely known for, novels, short …
An introduction to our existential special issue by Anja Steinbauer. Existentialism as a philosophical movement stretches from the mid 19th to the mid 20th century. Its leading figures included such giants as Søren Kierkegaard, Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, Simone de Beauvoir, Albert Camus and, of course, Jean-Paul Sartre. These thinkers had very different approaches and …
Kile Jones argues that atheistic existentialism is more compelling than religious existentialism. Existentialism, as I understand it, is primarily a philosophy of tragedy. It often speaks of tragedy as bound up with existence – that you cannot have one without the other. Tragedy Before the rise of German, and in turn French, existentialism, tragedy was …
Alex Holzman asks what a hero is, and if Camus’ infamous character qualifies. Heroics lie near the heart of both literary and historical culture. Something about the ‘greatness’ of heroes lends context to and brings to vivid life the events in which they took part and often come to represent. They are anchors in the …
Stuart Hanscomb argues that existentialism is punk philosophy par excellence. Whenever I’m asked “So, what exactly is existentialism?” I experience a sinking feeling. It’s a difficult philosophy to explain; efforts typically end up trivializing or obfuscating so much about it that is important, original, and relevant. A number of things account for this, but an …
Anja Steinbauer on Simone de Beauvoir’s Ethics of Ambiguity. “My life is my work,” Simone de Beauvoir once said. Spoken like a true Existentialist: to her, life and thought were inextricably linked; we are what we do. Existentialism is a philosophy that outlines the conditions of human existence but rejects any conception of human nature; …
Lucian Lupescu says the disputatious Dane dares us to live. There is a general tendency in the non-philosophical world to dismiss philosophy as being purely theoretical, with no connection to the types of problems that people are confronted within their everyday lives. But this is not necessarily true. Many philosophers struggled to find ways to …
Greg Stone presents the evidence. When Johnny Depp raises a wry eyebrow on screen, it’s an ‘existential performance’. When Donald Rumsfeld says there are ‘unknown unknowns’, they call it ‘existential poetry’. Though many politicians and entertainers welcome the label, Albert Camus certainly did not. Even so, many people, even in academic publications, have inaccurately identified …
Alisa Anokhina on how the quest for authenticity can help in treating depression. Colloquially, the word ‘depression’ is often used for listlessness, extreme sadness, or a profound sense of loss. It’s no wonder that so many people with a diagnosis of depression struggle to be taken seriously: to the unaffected, the problem sounds akin to …