Understanding Nancy, Understanding Modernism

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Over the past three decades, Jean-Luc Nancy has become one of the most celebrated contemporary philosophers. His remarkably diverse body of work, which deals with such topics as post-Heideggerian ontology, Christian painting, the experience of drunkenness, heart transplants, contemporary cinema and the problem of freedom, is entirely "immersed" in modernity, as he puts it. Within this plural framework, art which he explicitly defines as a modern construct plays a singular role in that it is the very prism through which he explores the problems of sense and feeling in general, particularly as they relate to our experience of modernity. The contributors to Understanding Nancy, Understanding Modernism fully delve into the heretofore under-acknowledged and under-explored modernism of Nancys writings on philosophy and the arts through close readings of his key works as well as broader essays on the relationship between his thought and aesthetic modernity. In addition to an interview with Nancy himself, a final section consists of an extended glossary of Nancys signature terms, which will be a valuable resource for students and experts alike.

Reviews

This is a stunning collection that will be a priceless resource for readers of Nancys work. The essays are deeply knowledgeable and together they chart remarkably clear paths through all the major features of Nancys world and his thinking of 'world.' * Peggy Kamuf, Professor Emerita of French and Italian and Comparative Literature, University of Southern California, USA *
The texts included here demonstrate in incisive ways not only how Nancy's writings open onto understanding modernity but also how questions of modernity offer new and compelling paths for reading Nancy. It is a wonderfully impressive volume. * Philip Armstrong, Professor of Comparative Studies, The Ohio State University, USA *
This volume is a timely and much-needed contribution to scholarship specifically on the critical pertinence of Jean-Luc Nancys thinking to modernism. What makes this volume additionally delightful is that it brings together experts on Nancys thought alongside up-and-coming scholars committed to advancing his thinking further into the future. * Irving Goh, Associate Professor of Literature, National University of Singapore, and author of The Reject: Community, Politics, and Religion after the Subject (2014), LExistence Prpositionnelle (2019), and The Deconstruction of Sex (2021, with Jean-Luc Nancy) *

Author Bio

Cosmin Toma is British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Oxford, St Hugh's College, UK. He has primarily published on modern and contemporary French literature, critical theory, music, and aesthetics. His first book, Neutraliser labsolu. Blanchot, Beckett et la chose littraire (2019) is an inquiry into what remains of what Nancy and Lacoue-Labarthe called the literary absolute when it is neutralized by modernity. He has also worked extensively as an academic translator.