Tragic Redemption

Robert R. Williams offers a bold new account of divergences and convergences in the work of Hegel and Nietzsche. He explores four themes - the philosophy of tragedy; recognition and community; critique of Kant; and the death of God - and explicates both thinkers' critiques of traditional theology and metaphysics.

Simone Weil's supernaturalist interpretations of tragedy challenge not only the philosophical skepticism but also the religious rationalism characteristic of the modern age. This book boldly points out a supernaturalist alternative to contemporary, post-structuralist literary theory. This study of classical tragic drama offers a sacralizing impetus to secular discussions of literature. The book's Platonic premises and its grounding in the transcendental outlook of the religious traditions furnish a sacred illumination. Religious mystery and the cross of Christ both overshadow and deepen philosophical approaches to literary criticism, including theories of tragedy. Simone Weil's conception of tragic art, rooted in a mystical Christian metaphysics, offers original insight into the nature of tragedy. In contradiction of the prevailing secular outlook, Weil regards classical tragedy as a sacred art form. Tragic masterpieces evoke not the chaotic or irrational, as modernist interpreters hold, but rather a good which is absolute

A licensed mental health therapist and ordained United Methodist minister, the author reveals how he was delivered from the deepest depths of despair and hopelessness to a sense of freedom and peace through God's grace and forgiveness.

Essays in this volume seek to clarify the meaning of tragedy and the tragic in its many German contexts, art forms, and disciplines, from literature and philosophy to music, painting, and history.

Simone Weil's supernaturalist interpretations of tragedy challenge not only the philosophical skepticism but also the religious rationalism characteristic of the modern age. This book boldly points out a supernaturalist alternative to contemporary, post-structuralist literary theory. This study of classical tragic drama offers a sacralizing impetus to secular discussions of literature. The book's Platonic premises and its grounding in the transcendental outlook of the religious traditions furnish a sacred illumination. Religious mystery and the cross of Christ both overshadow and deepen philosophical approaches to literary criticism, including theories of tragedy. Simone Weil's conception of tragic art, rooted in a mystical Christian metaphysics, offers original insight into the nature of tragedy. In contradiction of the prevailing secular outlook, Weil regards classical tragedy as a sacred art form. Tragic masterpieces evoke not the chaotic or irrational, as modernist interpreters hold, but rather a good which is absolute

The Tragic Odes of Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead is a multifaceted study of tragedy in the group’s live performances showing how Garcia brought about catharsis through dance by leading songs of grief, mortality, and ironic fate in a collective theatrical context. This musical, literary, and historical analysis of thirty-five songs with tragic dimensions performed by Garcia in concert with the Grateful Dead illustrates the syncretic approach and acute editorial ear he applied in adapting songs of Robert Hunter, Bob Dylan, and folk tradition. Tragically ironic situations in which Garcia found himself when performing these songs are revealed, including those related to his opiate addiction and final decline. This book examines Garcia’s musical craftsmanship and the Grateful Dead’s collective art in terms of the mystery-rites of ancient Greece, Friedrich Nietzsche’s Dionysus, 20th century American music rooted in New Orleans, Hermann Hesse’s Magic Theater, and the Greek Theatre at Berkeley, offering a clear prospect on an often misunderstood phenomenon. Featuring interdisciplinary analysis, close attention to musical and poetic strategies, and historical and critical contexts, this book will be of interest to scholars and researchers of Popular Music, Musicology, Cultural Studies, and American Studies, as well as to the Grateful Dead’s avid listeners.

Offering an alternative to classic Christian theodicies (justification of God's goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil), Wendy Farley interprets the problem of evil and suffering within a tragic context, advocating compassion to describe the power of God in the struggle against evil.

To Samuel Taylor Coleridge, tragedy was not solely a literary mode, but a philosophy to interpret the history that unfolded around him. Tragic Coleridge explores the tragic vision of existence that Coleridge derived from Classical drama, Shakespeare, Milton and contemporary German thought. Coleridge viewed the hardships of the Romantic period, like the catastrophes of Greek tragedy, as stages in a process of humanity’s overall purification. Offering new readings of canonical poems, as well as neglected plays and critical works, Chris Murray elaborates Coleridge’s tragic vision in relation to a range of thinkers, from Plato and Aristotle to George Steiner and Raymond Williams. He draws comparisons with the works of Blake, the Shelleys, and Keats to explore the factors that shaped Coleridge’s conception of tragedy, including the origins of sacrifice, developments in Classical scholarship, theories of inspiration and the author’s quest for civic status. With cycles of catastrophe and catharsis everywhere in his works, Coleridge depicted the world as a site of tragic purgation, and wrote himself into it as an embattled sage qualified to mediate the vicissitudes of his age.