Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy

Please join us at this link bit.ly/SPEPPhilLove Feb 12, 5pm-6:30pm E.T. for the second-ever SPEP webinar! Don't forget the chocolates. Happy Valentine's Day ;)

this but unironically. Logicians barely even have a theory of hermeneutics smh and I'm supposed to listen to them?

Proceed to this link and sign up for the SPEP webinar series newsletter: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

Next Wednesday SPEP hosts its inaugural webinar, this time on "Black Philosophy for Turbulent Times," in an ongoing series with updates to come; register for the April 23 evening event at this link! pomonacollege.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

On the French existentialists being based and epic: Sartre and de Beauvoir only caring about phenomenology insofar as it is in service of drinking cocktails

human resources v.s. ruthless critique of all existing things

Husserliana would be a beautiful name for a baby girl...

Don't tell Spinoza . . . psyche.co/ideas/reflec...

If you're 25-30 and your circle isn't often discussing:
-limits of the intellect
-if the universe enjoys a pre-established harmony
-proof of the soul's immortality
-on the relationship of the practical and the speculative
-emanationism and the monadology
Then it's time to elevate your circle.

A Letter From Gilles Deleuze | Edinburgh University Press Dorothea Olkowski reflects on the work of Gilles Deleuze through a letter she received from him at the inception of Deleuze studies.

SPEP member Dorothea Olkowski, recent author of "Deleuze, Bergson, and Merleau-Ponty: The Logic and Pragmatics of Affect, Perception, and Creation," reflects on a letter she once received from Gilles Deleuze:
euppublishingblog.com/2025/02/17/a...

Since getting to know this freest and mightiest of souls, I at least have come to feel what he felt about Plutarch: 'as soon as I glance at him I grow a leg or a wing.' If I were set the task, I could endeavour to make myself at home in the world with him.” Nietzsche by Munch:

Nietzsche as well esteemed de Montaigne, writing in Untimely Meditations: “I know of only one writer whom I would compare with Schopenhauer, indeed set above him, in respect of honesty: Montaigne. That such a man wrote has truly augmented the joy of living on this earth . . .

In her titular essay Virginia Woolf wrote “After all, in the whole of literature, how many people have succeeded in drawing themselves with a pen? Only Montaigne & Pepys & Rousseau perhaps [. . .] this art belonged to one man only: to Montaigne." Photographed by Gisèle Freund:

Celebrated by the modernists, T.S. Eliot wrote of Pascal’s antagonism toward de Montaigne that “by the time a man knew Montaigne well enough to attack him, he would already be thoroughly infected by him.” Eliot photographed below diagramming his play The Cocktail Party:

. . . a philosopher among fanatics, and who paints under his name our weaknesses and our follies–he is a man who will always be loved.” Voltaire depicted below in a bronze statue by the French rococo sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon.

Voltaire defended de Montaigne from Pascal’s opprobrium: “For he has painted human nature. Had Nicole and Malebranche always spoken of themselves then they would not have succeeded. But a country gentleman from the time of Henry III, a favourite in a century of ignorance . . .

Pascal ridiculed de Montaigne’s for his “foolish plan to paint himself.” What was bad in de Montaigne, claimed Pascal, “could have been corrected in a moment had someone warned him that he was making too much of a fuss talking too much about himself.”

De Montaigne’s great peer in the French moralist tradition, Blaise Pascal, nursed a lifelong ambition to refute the man. In the Pensées, Pascal attacked de Montaigne for his unmethodical style, lack of piety, & literary conceit for self-exposition. See below Pascal's death mask.

Known by his motto, inscripted below, “What do I know?” (que sçay-je? in Middle-French, the language he wrote his Essays in, breaking from the prevailing Latin tradition).

Died aged 59 in 1592. Famous as a statesman, later for popularizing the essay as a literary genre, de Montaigne’s influence extends beyond his towering stature in the Renaissance era, reaching philosophers as varied from Francis Bacon to Friedrich Nietzsche. Château de Montaigne:

Born February 28, 1533, at the Château de Montaigne in the Kingdom of France was Michel Eyquem, Seigneur de Montaigne, known today as celebrated man of letters Michel de Montaigne. Pictured below in a depiction by the famed portrait artist of 17th C Europe Daniel Dumonstier.