Soren Kierkegaard's Concluding Unscientific Postscript has provoked a lively variety of divergent interpretations for a century and a half. It has been both celebrated and condemned as the chief inspiration for twentieth-century existential thought, as a subversive parody of philosophical argument, as a critique of mass society, as a forerunner of phenomenology and of postmodern relativism, and as an appeal for a renewal of religious commitment. These 2010 essays written by international Kierkegaard scholars offer a plurality of critical approaches to this fundamental text of existential philosophy. They cover hotly debated topics such as the tension between the Socratic-philosophical and the Christian-religious; the identity and personality of Kierkegaard's pseudonym 'Johannes Climacus'; his conceptions of paradoxical faith and of passionate understanding; his relation to his contemporaries and to some of his more distant predecessors; and, last but not least, his pertinence to our present-day concerns.

These 2010 essays offer a plurality of critical approaches to Kierkegaard's fundamental text of existential philosophy and explore its contemporary relevance.

About the Author
Rick Anthony Furtak is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Colorado College. His publications include Wisdom in Love: Kierkegaard and the Ancient Quest for Emotional Integrity (2005) and Rilke's 'Sonnets to Orpheus' (2007). A devoted teacher of existential thought, he has published widely on a variety of topics in moral psychology and in the philosophy of literature.

Reviews
'One of the most noteworthy features of Kierkegaard's 'Concluding Unscientific Postscript': A Critical Guide is that it lives up to its subtitle. This collection truly is a guide to the work as a whole ... [It] contains significant steps forward in our understanding of this complex text, the difficulty of which continues to reward the sharpest critical study.' Jeffrey Hanson, Australian Catholic University



Book Information
ISBN 9780521897983
Author Rick Anthony Furtak
Format Hardback
Page Count 272
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 560g
Dimensions(mm) 235mm * 161mm * 11mm