ROUSSEAU'S PLATONIC ENLIGHTENMENT by David Lay Williams, Patrick Riley (Foreword) ( 9780271029986 )

Item Details

Title:

ROUSSEAU'S PLATONIC ENLIGHTENMENT

By:

David Lay Williams, Patrick Riley (Foreword)

Format:

Paperback

List price:

£29.95

Our price:

£29.05

Discount:

3% off

You save:

£0.90

ISBN 10:

0271029986

ISBN 13:

9780271029986

Availability:

Usually dispatched within 1-3 weeks.

Delivery rates

Stock:

Currently 0 available

Publisher:

PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS

Pub. date:

1 October, 2008

Pages:

344

Synopsis:

Although many commentators on Rousseau's philosophy have noted its affinities with Platonism and acknowledged the debt that Rousseau himself expressed to Plato on numerous occasions, David Williams is the first to offer a thoroughgoing, systematic examination of this linkage. His contributions to the scholarship on Rousseau in this book are threefold: he enters the debate over whether Rousseau is a Hobbesian (in rejecting transcendent norms) or a Platonist (in accepting them) with a decisive argument supporting the latter position; he tackles from a new angle the ever-challenging question of unity in Rousseau's thought; and, he explores the dynamic metaphor of the chain throughout Rousseau's writings as a key to understanding them as inspired by Platonism. The book is organized into three main parts. The first sketches the background of Platonism and materialist positivism in modern European metaphysics and political philosophy that provided the context for Rousseau's intellectual development. The second examines Rousseau's choice of Platonism over positivism and its consequences for his philosophy generally.The third addresses the legacy of Rousseau's thought and its appropriation by Kant, Marx, and Foucault, suggesting that in an age where materialism and relativism are rife, Rousseau may have much to teach us about how we view our own society and can engage in constructive critique of it.

Publication:

Imprint:

Pennsylvania State University Press

Returns:

Returnable

Some other items by this author:

A SERIOUS AFFAIR (HB)

BOSSUET: POLITICS DRAWN FROM THE VERY WORDS OF HOLY SCRIPTURE (PB)

CHARACTER AND CONVERSION IN AUTOBIOGRAPHY (HB)

CIVILIZING SEX

CIVILIZING SEX (HB)

ESSAYS ON POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY (HB)