About Me

"What Get Wrong About Nietzsche's Nihilism"

The essay takes issue with popular interpretations of Nietzsche that he simply wanted us to embrace life as meaningless. For Nietzsche, nihilism is a historical crisis that needs to be overcome. The essay defines several aspects of nihilism: ethical, political, epistemological and historical (Nietzsche's innovation). Then, the essay outlines the history of nihilism as understood by Nietzsche and how it is completed and overcome through the affirmation of the eternal return. Finally, the essay quickly discusses the postmodernist, Straussian and Heideggerian responses to Nietzsche's description of the history of nihilism.  

"Referential Bodies and Signs: Problems with the Nietzschean-Derridean Interpretation of Augustine"

The essay attempts to refute the Nietzschean claim that Augustine, and medieval-Christian thought generally, is founded on a denial of the body, as well as the Derridean claim that Augustine is logocentric, eschewing any mediation of full presence. The essay explores the Augustinian conception of being as hierarchical, analogical, and referential. In this way, Augustine’s notions of existence involve an affirmation of the entirety of being, not a denial of it. This conception applies to the Augustinian notion of the nature of the sign as well. If we read Augustine on his own terms, we see the possibility of affirming beings as a whole and recognizing the beauty in all things.  

"The Ancient Liberty of Milton's Epic Verse"

The essay is a discussion of Milton's Paradise Lost that takes as its point of departure the reflections on "The Verse" that Milton appended to the poem in the 1674 edition. While the epic invocation boldly states that Milton will describe things "unattempted yet in Prose or Rhime" (Book I.16), the preface on "The Verse" claims that Milton's poem is to be situated within a poetic tradition reaching back to Homer and Virgil. The rules of this poetic tradition provide a certain "ancient liberty", which Milton contrasts with "license" in Sonnet 12. The essay makes the point that part of what is original in Milton's epic is his search for first causes -- "say first what cause" (Book I.28) -- that transcends the search for causes in material bodies undertaken by philosophers as well as the search for divine causes undertaken in the "middle flight" of the pagan poets. Yet, Milton's poetic form and language also adhere to and expand upon the poetic tradition, in particular with his use of epic similes that consciously refer to the epic similes utilized by Dante, Virgil and Homer. The essay concludes by alluding to this pious reverence for the poetic tradition as one of the ways in which we can distinguish Miltonic poetics from the the pride of Satan. That is, although both Satan and Milton audaciously attempt things "unattempted", Satan's goal is self-assertion while Milton's goal is the revelation of God's Will as that which is "first" in the highest sense. 

"Robinson Crusoe and Modernity"

The essay is a discussion of Defoe’s novel as an oscillation between a search for a Divine providential meaning in the plights of existence and a more secular interpretation of phenomena. The essay shows how Crusoe as narrator tries to reflect back on his journey as a sort of spiritual self-discovery; however, his own actions and deepest passions (in the form of his naturalistic interpretation of events on the island as well as his excessive attachment to wealth) undermine this spiritual orientation. This oscillation between the explanatory frameworks offered by Christianity and secular modernity, I assert, make the novel still relevant and powerful for us today.

"Nietzsche’s Gift: On the First Part of Thus Spoke Zarathustra"

Friedrich Nietzsche referred to his own philosophy as an inversion of Platonism. It has yet to be clearly established, however, what exactly this meant for Nietzsche. This paper examines the First Part of Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra in light of Nietzsche’s relation to Plato. The paper asserts that one key for understanding Nietzsche’s inversion of Platonism is coming to grips with the reversal of Plato’s art of philosophic communication that takes place in the First Part of Thus Spoke Zarathustra. This reversal of Platonic communication is undertaken by means of the thematic of the “Gift”. That is, Platonic communication is likened to a gift-giving that responds to the needs of its recipients. Platonic, or “esoteric”, philosophic communication adapts its message to the needs of the listener – veiling its message in order to protect listeners from harmful philosophic truths. Zarathustra, on the other hand, learns a new form of communication in the First Part, one that is driven by the imperatives of the speaker or giver, not the listener or recipient: “How can I give each his own? Let this be sufficient for me: I give each my own."

"Nietzsche’s Early Political Thinking II: ‘The Greek State’"

This paper attempts to uncover the political aspects of Nietzsche’s early thinking through an extended discussion of his essay “The Greek State.” The paper builds on a similar discussion of another essay from the same period, “Homer on Competition,” in arguing that Nietzsche’s thinking is based on a confrontation with the work of Plato. It is argued that the key to understanding “The Greek State” is seeing it, in its entirety, as an enigmatic interpretation and re-writing of Plato’s Republic. Nietzsche interprets the Republic as Plato’s accomplishment of the task of the genuine philosopher: the legislation of values and the molding of human character.

"The Aesthetics of the Good Physician"

In Self-Consuming Artifacts, Stanley Fish outlines what he calls “The Aesthetics of the Good Physician.” Within the Western tradition, according to Fish, the dialectician as physician leads the auditor to a place where he or she can abandon the realm of rhetoric and images. The texts of Plato, More, and Spenser, however, present another possibility for the relation between dialectic and rhetoric: a relation which confirms the necessity of each element within the unity of the whole. 

"Spenser’s Pharmacy: Nature and Art in The Faerie Queene I.iv-v"

"Hamlet and Modern Metaphysics"

This paper discusses the ways in which Shakespeare's Hamlet instantiates the modern metaphysics of the subject, as most fully articulated in the philosophy of Rene Descartes. In addition, the paper connects this modern, subject-centered way of thinking with the revolution in modern natural philosophy undertaken by Francis Bacon.  Hamlet sets up his own Baconian scientific experiment in the form of "The Mouse Trap".  

The Question of Representation in Elizabethan Literature

My PhD dissertation: a Heideggerian reading of Sidney's Defence of Poesy, Spenser's The Faerie Queene and Shakespeare's Hamlet with the goal of demonstrating that these Elizabethan authors present a non-representational, non-metaphysical possibility for how the poetic art work can be experienced.

"Foucault, Genealogy, History"

This paper assesses the genealogical method of Michel Foucault, comparing it to Friedrich Nietzsche's genealogical method. It is found that the two authors share parallel metaphysical points of departure in their respective concepts of "power/knowledge" and "will to power".   

“Questions of Being: An Exploration of Enduring Dreams”