Born on this date (6 November). Here is Roger Kimball’s well-known take. Here too is The Monist issue dedicated to “The Philosophy of Robert Musil” and Mette Blok’s article “Robert Musil’s Literary Ethics: The Man without Qualities Reconsidered“. Musil’s debut The Confusions of Young Törless is freely available here as is Vol. I of his masterpiece The Man Without Qualities. Last,…
George Ikkos has a short piece in The British Journal of Psychiatry 212: 1: 56. George IkkosMan Without Qualitiesmodernityphilosophical literaturepsychiatryRobert Musil
A recent freely available article by sociologist Bo Isenberg entitled “A modern calamity – Robert Musil on stupidity” in Journal of Classical Sociology. This voluntary subordination might be dispassionate or fanatical and relates to not only collective ideologies, nationalism and totalitarianism but also excessive rationalism. To Musil, nationalism and totalitarianism are manifestations of the most treacherous forms…
Looking forward to reading this little book I’ve just acquired: Nachlass zu Lebzeiten (The posthumerous papers of a living author), 1936. I haven’t come across much commentary on it, but it is mentioned in the NYT: In these ”Posthumous Papers,” Musil’s pleasure is to start small. The first essay, ”Flypaper,” begins with an almost pedantic description…
The article examines several references to Friedrich Nietzsche made by Robert Musil in his non-fictional writings. An indication of Nietzsche’s significance for Musil is given by the fact that only one name occurs more often than Nietzsche’s in the collected works of Musil, where references to the philosopher span a period of more than forty…
Here’s a very clear explication of the genesis of The Man Without Qualities along with an exploration of some of the central themes with some biographical detail. If ever there was a novel that’s appropriate for the prevailing fragmented times, it is this one. Der Mann ohne Eigenschaftenexistentialisml’homme sans qualitéMan Without Qualitiesphilosophical literatureRobert MusilSusanne Klingenstein
Excerpt from Robert Musil’s Man Without Qualities Volume One Translated by Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser Picador (1979) 28 A chapter that can be skipped by anyone who has no very high opinion of thinking as an occupation MEANWHILE Ulrich was at home, sitting at his desk, working. He had got out the analysis that…
Burton Pike, editor and translator of Robert Musil’s titanic though unfinished novel, The Man Without Qualities, discusses the philosophical and aesthetic ideas circulating in pre-war Viennese society as depicted in the novel. Podcast here. The discussion bears a striking resemblance to Percy’s concerns — no surprise there. Also check out David Auerbach’s commentary on Pike’s…
Here is the long awaited lineup for Bence Nanay’s issue for The Monist (97:1 Jan 2014). Bence Nanay The Dethroning of Ideocracy: Robert Musil as a Philosopher Robert Musil was not a professional philosopher. He was a novelist— and according to the widely accepted canon, his contribution to the twentieth-century novel is only matched by very…
Here is the intro to a review essay: Butterfly in the Typewriter: The Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of A Confederacy of Dunces. Cory MacLauchlin. Boston and New York: Da Capo Press, 2012, 319 pages, $26.00 hardcover. The book is not autobiography; neither is it altogether invention. While the…
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