Caring for the Soul in a Postmodern Age, livre ebook

The first full exploration of the political thought of Jan Patocka, student of Husserl and Heidegger and mentor to Václav Havel.

The first full exploration of the political thought of Jan Patocka, student of Husserl and Heidegger and mentor to Václav Havel.

In 1977 the sixty-nine-year-old Czech philosopher Jan Patočka died from a brain hemorrhage following a series of interrogations by the Czechoslovak secret police. A student of Husserl and Heidegger, he had been arrested, along with young playwright Václav Havel, for publicly opposing the hypocrisy of the Czechoslovak Communist regime. Patočka had dedicated himself as a philosopher to laying the groundwork of what he termed a "life in truth."

This book analyzes Patočka's philosophy and political thought and illuminates the synthesis in his work of Socratic philosophy and its injunction to "care for the soul." In bridging the gap, not only between Husserl and Heidegger, but also between postmodern and ancient philosophy, Patočka presents a model of democratic politics that is ethical without being metaphysical, and transcendental without being foundational.

Acknowledgments
1. Introduction
2. "Concrete Humans in Their Corporeal World": An Interpretation of Husserl and Heidegger

Husserl
The Influence of Heidegger
A Phenomenology of Movement
Conclusion

3. Philosophy After the Death of Metaphysics: Patocka and Greek Thought

Plato and Europe
Caring for the Soul
Metaphysics and "Negative Platonism"
The Idea, the Good, and the Truth
4. A Philosophy of History and a Theory of Politics

The Basis of Human Historicity
A Philosophy of History
The Polis in History
Two Elements of Historical Life: Freedom and Problematicity
Philosophy of History and Politics
Europe, Science, and Metaphysics
5. Politics and Ethics in the Twentieth Century

Patocka and Politics
The Heretical Essays and the Twentieth Century
The Spiritual Person and the Polis
Ethics and Morality
6. Conclusion: Foundations and Philosophy, Politics and Postmoderism

The Problem of Meaning
Meaning, Politics, and Conflict
Conclusion
Perspective

Appendix: Patocka's Reception in the English-Language Literature

Patocka as Conflicted Humanist
Patocka as Postmodern: Antifoundationalism, Theology, and Liberalism
Notes
Works Cited
Index