Tough Enough: Weil, Arendt, McCarthy, Sontag, Arbus, & Didion
Bookline/Booksmith /GBH Forum Network
Recommended
Reflections on War
Politics, pp. 51-56.
The Saint & the Hero: Iris Murdoch & Simone Weil
Sofia de Melo Araujo & Fatima Vieira, eds., Iris Murdoch: Philosopher Meets Novelist (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2011), pp. 103-116.
Force or Fragility? Simone Weil and Two Faces of Joan of Arc
“Pirruccello begins the chapter with a discussion of Weil’s search for “skillful models of spirituality.” Following a brief biographical sketch of Weil, she turns to a discussion of Weil’s reflections on Joan of Arc. She first considers Weil’s critical reflections on the view of Joan of Arc in popular culture in wartime France. She then turns to Weil’s comparison of the story of Joan of Arc to that of Arjuna in the Bhagavad-Gita and Weil’s identification of what she feels to be the critical difference between them. Pirruccello goes on to consider Weil’s alternative reading of the story of Joan of Arc and the positive aspects it could contribute to a model of skillful spirituality. In so doing, Pirrucello offers an interesting discussion of Weil’s historical methodology and its contribution to her reflections on France, especially in The Need for Roots.” (Source here).
in Ann W. Astell & Bonnie Wheeler, eds., Joan of Arc and Spirituality, Palgrave Macmillan (2004), pp. 267-281.
“Decreation as Destruction or as Creation?”
The ethical implications of Simone Weil’s “decreation” are perhaps the most controversial of her work and it is difficult to determine if she is asserting a violent destruction of the human body or a creation of the human spirit as linked with God. Rowan Williams claims that Weil’s decreation requires the “I” to dissolve completely and thus collapses the site of ethics but Yoon Sook Cha argues that the ethical site opened in Weil is not the “I” but the “in-between”. I will suggest that decreation holds both destruction/ death and creation/ life open in order to enter a radical shift in perspective from dualistic to relational through the creation of a bridge between the I and God.
Kathryn Lawson is a Ph.D. Candidate in the department of philosophy at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
‘None Enters Here Unless He is a Geometer’: Simone Weil on the Immorality of Algebra
Abstract
The French philosopher Simone Weil (1909-1943) thought of geometry and algebra not as complementary modes of mathematical investigation, but rather as constituting morally opposed approaches: whereas geometry is the sine qua non of inquiry leading from ruthless passion to temperate perception, in accord with the human condition, algebra leads in the reverse direction, to excess and oppression. We explore the constituents of this argument, with their roots in classical Greek thought, and also how Simone Weil came to qualify it following her exchange with her brother, the mathematician André Weil.
Axiomathes, vol. 32, no. 2 (July, 2022)
About the Author
Aviad Heifetz is a professor in the Department of Management and Economics at the Open University of Israel.
Simone Weil: Lectures on Philosophy
Cambridge University Press, intro by Peter Winch, trans. Hugh Price
Soul Learns Everything from Body
The Living Philosophy of Simone Weil
Albert Camus called the philosopher Simone Weil “the only great spirit of our times.” T.S. Eliot said she was the greatest saint of the 20th century. Charles de Gaulle said she was insane. But who is she and what is the Simone Weil philosophy? Despite dying at the age of 34, Simone Weil lived a life that rivaled any philosopher. And it was the authentic life of a philosopher following her inner compass. She did not fall in with the intellectual milieu of her time by becoming a public intellectual (which was far from a matter of intelligence — she finished 1st in her class for philosophy at France’s elite university the École Normale Supérieure beating out Simone de Beauvoir in second place). She was born into a Jewish family and raised agnostic and yet found herself drawn towards religion; she fought in the Spanish Civil War and worked in factories for a year to understand the working class.
The Living Philosophy (YouTube), June 20, 2021
Education and the ethics of attention: The work of Simone Weil
This paper argues that the influential French thinker, Simone Weil, has something distinctive and important to offer educational and ethical inquiry. Weil’s ethical theory is considered against the backdrop of her life and work, and in relation to her broader ontological, epistemological and political position. Pivotal concepts in Weil’s philosophy – gravity, decreation, and grace – are discussed, and the educational implications of her ideas are explored. The significance of Weil’s thought for educationists lies in the unique emphasis she places on the development of attention, a notion elaborated here via the key themes of truth, beauty, and love.
British Journal of Educational Studies (Aug. 22, 2022)
- Professor Peter Roberts, University of Cambridge, School of Educational Studies & Leadership. His many works include “Simone Weil: Education, Spirituality and Political Commitment,” in Kirylo JD (ed.), A Critical Pedagogy of Resistance: 34 Pedagogues We Need to Know (Rotterdam: Sense Publishers, 2013), pp. 129-132.
