Inside Issue 4: New and Forthcoming
Forthcoming in Next Issue
Some of content that will appear in the next issue includes the following:
— “A Q&A Interview with Jacques Cabaud, One of Simone Weil’s First Biographers”
— Jacques Cabaud, “The Reluctant Witness: A Few Recollections of Simone Deitz and Related Matters”
— Thierry Leterre, “A philosophy “written for everyone”: From Alain to Simone Weil”
New in This Issue
Articles
In this issue, we are pleased to make available Fr. Joseph-Marie Perrin’s introduction to Waiting for God — this for the first time in English thanks to Professor Lawrence Schmidt’s translation.
— Joseph-Marie Perinn, Preface to Waiting on God
Professor Doering has also prepared an original introductory essay on Perrin and Weil.
— E. Jane Doering, “A Spiritual Friendship: Simone Weil and Père Perrin”
Professor Moore’s essay on Marie-Magdeleine Davy (who wrote the first book on Weil) provides some new insights both into Weil and how Davy set out to preserve her memory and legacy.
— Brenna Moore, “Marie-Magdeleine Davy and the Memory of Simone Weil“
Q&A Interview
This is an exchange with the translators of Weil’s unfinished play “Venice Saved.”
— “Unfinished: OnVenice Saved – a Q&A with Silvia Caprioglio Panizza and Philip Wilson”
Short Story
The short story below, the first in Attention, sketches the difficulties that two well-intentioned people encounter when confronted with the specter of affliction and their attempt to act charitably in the face of it.
— Ronald Collins, “The Other”
Book Reviews
— Eric Springsted, “Was Simone Weil an anti-Semite?,” reviewing Robert Chenavier, Simone Weil, une Juive antisémite? Éteindre les Polémiques (Gallimard, 2021)
— Mario Von Der Ruhr, Decreation and the Ethical Bind: Simone Weil and the Claim of the Other (originally in Modern Language Review (2018))
Editorial
— “The Impending Death of Democracy?”
Recent and Upcoming Events
— “Translations of Beauty: Simone Weil and Literature,” American Weil Society (March 17-19, 2022). Attention is a co-sponsor of this colloquy.
— “Religion, Collaboration, and Resistance during the Second World War” (abstract), American Historical Association, and the American Catholic Historical Association (Jan. 2022)
In the News
— “La Passion de Simone” at Novaya Opera,” The Moscow Times (Jan. 5, 2022)
“This year an oratorio by Kaija Saariaho will be performed during the annual Epiphany Festival at Novaya Opera in Moscow. This Finnish-French composer has been called the best composer alive by The New York Times, with the opera “Innocence” premiering in Aix-en-Provence in summer 2021 and her symphonic work “Vista” premiering a few months later. While alluding to the tradition of Passions in Western music, the oratorio relates the tragic life of French religious thinker and philosopher Simone Weil. It will be conducted by Valentin Uryupin, Novaya Opera’s artistic director.”
New Books
— George M. Alliger, Work: Psychological Investigations into Its Truths, Problems, and Solutions (Routledge, Nov. 30, 2021) (Ch. 13 “Thinking While You Work: Simone Weil”), pp. 177-186. (See George Alliger’s, “Social Capital versus Roots: A Review of Bowling Alone,” Attention (no. 3, 2021).
Michael McGirr, Ideas To Save Your Life (Text Publishing, 2021) (chapter 16 is on Weil)
New Books from Abroad
— Florence De Lussy, Simone Weil (French Edition) (2021)
Throughout her life, Simone Weil tried to understand herself and the world and pushed back the horizon of the intelligible to try to think of God. With firmness but using great psychological finesse, she made men’s grandeur and miseries appear in full light. An uncomfortable figure that cannot leave anyone indifferent, she always provokes so many contradictory and often violent reactions. But everyone agrees on one thing: Simone Weil’s strength is her purity.
Florence de Lussy restores this purity of the gaze to us with great honesty, without ever forgetting the excesses and errors of the author of The Need for Roots, depicted here in chiaroscuro. At the end of these pages, it is the great philosopher – who was at the same time a mystic – who imposes herself. A welcome essay, uncompromising and bursting with truth. [translation from the French abstract]
New Articles
— Benjamin P. Davis, “Simone Weil’s Method: Essaying Reality through Inquiry and Action,” Comparative and Continental Philosophy, vol. 13 (Nov. 23, 2021)
— Helen M. Kinsella, “Of Colonialism and Corpses: Simone Weil on Force,” in Patricia Owens & Katharina Rietzler, eds., Women’s International Thought: A New History, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press (2021), pp. 72-92.
— Kait Pinder, “Sheila Watson as a Reader of Simone Weil: Decreation, Affliction, and Metaxu in The Double Hook,” University of Toronto Quarterly, vol. 90, no. 4 (Fall 2021), pp. 669-690.
— Zahra Qasemzadeh & Mostafa Mousavi Azam, “Decreation in Simone Weil’s Theology,” Religions & Mysticism, vol. 54, no. 1 (Summer/Autumn 2021), pp. 195-215
— Zahra Qasemzadeh, Seyyed Mostafa Mousavi Azam, & Ehsan Momtahen, “Attention in Simone Weil’s Thought,” Philosophy of Religion Research, vol. 19, no. 37, issue 1 (Summer/Autumn 2021), pp. 1-28
New Book Review Essays
— Jacqueline Rose, “An Endless Seeing,” New York Review of Books (Jan. 13, 2022) (reviewing Robert Zaretsky’s The Subversive Simone Weil)
— Janelle Pötzsch, Book Review of Robert Zaretsky’s “The Subversive Simone Weil,” Teaching Philosophy, vol. 45, no 1 (March 2022), pp. 128-130
Updated Encyclopedic Entry
— A. Rebecca Rozelle-Stone & Benjamin P. Davis, “Simone Weil,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Updated: Dec. 2021)
New Video
— “Reading Simone Weil in East London – Dr Anna Rowlands,” Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide Webinar (Dec. 9, 2021)
Newly Posted Articles
— Eric Springsted, “Contradiction, Mystery and The Use of Words in Simone Weil,” Religion & Literature, vol. 17, no. 2, Simone Weil (Summer, 1985)
— Rico Sneller, “Suffering Divine Things: Simone Weil and Jewish Mysticism,” in Mahmoud Masaeli, ed., Spirituality and Global Ethics (Cambridge Scholars Publishing (2017), pp. 9-26
— Benjamin Braude, “Simone’s Svengalis: A Petainist, a Missionary, and the Making of Simone Weil,” Boisi Center (Feb. 11, 2015) (transcribed interview)
— Paula Nicole C. Eugenio, “The Growing of Roots in Times of Turmoil and Uncertainty: Simone Weil’s Legacy,” “Simone Weil’s Philosophy of Authentic Living” (excerpted from: Master’s Thesis, University of Santo Tomas, Manila, May 2020).
Newly Posted Dissertation
— Paul James Grote, Jr., “Simone Weil, Leo Strauss, and Paul Ricoeur on the Conflict of Power and Wisdom in Plato’s Republic,” M.A., Department of Philosophy, University of Louisville (1982)
New Performance / Publication
— “Parola e musica nel tempo di Avvento 2021 2°- Simone Weil” [thoughts and music for Advent 2021 2°- Simone Weil] {Italian}
— “Anemones—A Simone Weil Project” (2021)
Newly Posted Transcribed Radio Interview
— Iris Murdoch, “‘Waiting on God’: A Radio Talk on Simone Weil,” transcript of BBC broadcast, Oct.18, 1951
Community Service
— “Advent Evening of Reflection: Invitation from Simone Weil Catholic Worker” (2021)
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