Customer Reviews

Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy

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IRRATIONAL MAN is a great read for anyone interested in existentialism. William Barrett does not bore, and he covers existentialism from its roots in Hebraism and Hellenism to its development by its most famous spokesman, Jean-Paul Sartre. For Barrett, existentialism is a personal and relevant matter, and he passionately reminds the reader that it is a philosophy for the modern age, an age of atomic weaponry. Though he has only four chapters on particular existentialists (Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre), he also addresses various other figures such as St. Augustine, Descartes, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy. The scope of this work is vast.

The aforementioned "existentialists" have disparate views, but all share the understanding that reason has its limits, that man is alone in the world, and that to live, one must face one's own finitude. Each thinker comes to their ideas from a unique point of view and Barrett connects their ideas with their personal historical context. What we have is a study that is coherent and enlightening, passionate and somehow urgent.

But perhaps it is a little too passionate, too grandiose. He has romantic notions of greatness, in art and in thought. Sometimes he seems too sure of his interpretations as well, but it is up to me to go to the original sources he writes about and try his findings against mine.

In the end, the very fact that I desire to read directly the works of the four existentialists he writes about shows to me that Barrett has done a fine job, and he has simultaneously clarified and deepened my understanding of existentialism beyond the famous line "existence precedes essence." As an introduction or a supplement, IRRATIONAL MAN is an essential, and entertaining, work.

The book largely responsible for bringing the existential thought patterns to America, Barrett's book is a wonderful read. Unlike so many critical books and works of philosophy which are dry and dull, Barrett is a colorful writer with great imagery and a flowing language. He sums up beautifully the historical and social factors that lead to the existential revolution as well as captures the feeling of alienation that modern man feels almost as well as Camus did in Sisyphus.

Minds like Kierkegaard, Hiedegger, and Sartre are brilliant, but often their writing is convoluted and complex. Barrett simplifies their concepts while giving a thorough and clear exposition of them. After reading this book, a person will have a good basic knowledge of the philosophical underpinnings of existential philosophy and should be able to converse with others who are knowledgeable on the subject. I heartily recommend it to those who feel as if they are a stranger to the rest of humanity and to themselves.

Near the beginning of his book, Barrett quotes a bit of verse by Yeats:

"Now that my ladder's gone,/ I must lie down where all ladders start,/ In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart."

This is the problematic of existentialism, which Barrett (correctly) identifies as the "homelessness" of man in a world bereft of religion, hitherto his only sure ladder to the transcendent. Existentialism might succinctly be defined as the attempt to continue living philosophically in the deafening, intolerable silence that follows the collapse of that ladder. This basic theme is traced from the thought of our forebears, as far back as Ecclesiastes and Augustine, but also more recently in Pascal and Swift, through Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, to Sartre, Camus, and Gabriel Marcel, among others. In the end Barrett seems to offer two conclusions. The first is that the choice between theism and atheism matters less than the recognition of man's desperation in the face of the Silence. The second is that unchecked rationality, enshrined in modern scientism (not to be confused with science) is the enemy of reason. There is, as he notes, a distinction between being rational and being reasonable; some of the most insane and ludicrous schemes--like Mutual Assured Destruction--have been arrived at with impeccable rationality, because no wisdom had interfered with the intelligence of those involved. Although existentialism cannot in the end offer a way out of the Silence, this book is invaluable for its humanizing theme and its recognition of facts that our culture is all too eager to sweep under the rug. It is worth the while of any thoughtful person to read it.

This was the first book I've ever read on existentialism. In my experience it can be very well read without extensive prior philosophical knowledge.

Barrett places the rise of existentialism in it's time and in the context of world history, modernisation, individualism, the changes in religious feelings, and more. By going deep into the lives and work of Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Nietzsche and Sartre, Barrett shows 4 very different representatives of exisitentialism, thus giving the reader a wide perspective on the subject. Barrett is a master in presenting difficult abstract concepts in understandable language.

I've found the book both fascinating and inspiring. I can highly recommend it.

This book is quite helpful to all those interested in the study of existentialism. Whether you are a student of philosophy, psychology, literature, or love wisdom, this book will be very useful.

Particularly useful are Barrett's summations of the four philosophers: Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre.

Finally if you're tired of those books on philosophy that truly transcend even the level of Einstein's comprehension, you will find this one to be very user friendly.

Nothing is more exhausting than the search for meaning. Every question has a thousand answers, each claiming to be correct. And each can be challenged by a thousand objections. Evermore we come out the same door as in we went, and return to -- ourselves. We alone are unavoidably the final arbiters of our personal beliefs and values. Occasionally we have the good fortune to find a guide through the jungle of perplexing philosophical questions who can explain issues clearly, distinctly, and quietly, without forcing his personal conclusions on us. But how do we know the guide is reliable? Before we have heard what he has to say, we don't. And if we chose to believe that he is reliable, that is our choice.

I agree with the many readers of _Irrational Man_ that Barrett is a remarkably persuasive guide. Not that I agree with him completely -- nobody's beliefs can totally correspond with those of another. No matter. Barrett has his feet on the ground, and one gets the feeling when reading him that however convoluted the explanation -- and some (but not all) explanations are necessarily convoluted -- Barrett is not playing with smoke and mirrors. My recommendation is to read a few pages of what he has to say as critically as you please, and then decide for yourself.

William Barrett (1913-1992) grew up in the generation just before and after WWII. His memoir _The Truants: Adventures among the Intellectuals_ (1982), recounts his early days at _Partisan Review_ and his associations with such figures as Delmore Schwartz, Mary McCarthy, Edmund Wilson, and Philip Rahv. Very interesting as biography; no philosophy. The book is out of print but can be found for a ridiculously low price. [This author's middle name was Christopher, I think, although he uses neither the name nor initial to identify his writings. He is not to be confused with William E. (Edmund) Barrett (1900-1986), the novelist, and at least one other William Barrett, who appears to be a psychoanalyst.]

_Irrational Man: A study in Existential Philosophy_ (1958) is credited with being largely responsible for introducing existentialism to America. Two years earlier Barrett edited and published a work that might be described as the first attempt to provide a serious philosophical rationale for the post-war "Zen Boom": _Zen Buddhism: Selected Writings of D.T. Suzuki_(Doubleday Anchor, 1956). Both books are still selling well, a half century later. But Barrett, like many others, was put off by the pretentious antics of the Beat Generation:

`Twenty years ago, . . . I played a small part in introducing Zen to this country, and I have not always been happy with the results. American youth acquired another vocabulary to throw around. The "mindlessness" that Zen recommended was pursued by the young in the haze of marijuana and drugs. They forgot, if they had ever learned, the prosaic and magnificent saying of the sage Hui-Neng: "The Tao [the truth] is your ordinary mind." In recent years I have let myself forget all about Zen, and probably have been nearer to its spirit. Stick to your ordinary mind, reader, and forget the tabs. Find your own rocks and trees.' (_The Illusion of Technique: A Search for Meaning in a Technological Civilization_ , 1978, , p. 371)

Judging from Amazon's book listings, Barrett's later works do not sell as well as his early ones -- which is not to say that they are not worth our attention. Philosophical popularity is rarely a measure of worth. The rather substantial (392 pp.) _Illusion of Technique_ was followed by _Death of the Soul: From Descartes to the Computer_ (1986), a rather slight volume summing up his conclusions.

Barrett taught philosophy at New York University, 1950-1979, but was no "ivory tower" intellectual. He was well aware of what may be called the gap between phenomenalism and scientific materialism. He lucidly explores the issues, but offers no easy answers. If you are interested in ideas, see what an involved thinker has to say.

Readers may be interested to know that in 1962, four years after _Irrational Man_, Barrett teamed up with Henry D. Aiken to produce a 4-volume set called _Philosophy in the Twentieth Century: An Anthology_. (Random House) -- an anthology of extracts with extensive introductions. Vol. Three, Part Four (Phenomenology and Existentialism), pp. 123-450 !!, returns to the topic, this time with the inclusion of Camus and Bergson. As of this writing, Amazon lists the set under two numbers, but ASIN: B000AQLUMQ (which can be typed in as a title) has an extensive list of dealers with sets and individual copies at good prices. I highly recommend checking them out.

Rereading this book for the the first time in ten years, I can see clearly how much it has meant to my understanding -- and how truly excellent it is.

Barrett has a profound gift for seeing philosophy in a way that is both adequate -- and accessible. Reading this narrative of the roots and the development of modern existentialism makes it come alive, makes it not just lucid and comprehensible, but exciting.

Part of Barrett's advantage is the breadth and quality of his knowledge. I haven't ever "caught him out" -- saying something that I find shallow or silly when he makes reference to literature that I know, etc.

Part of his advantage is that he writes really well -- with a kind of invisible clarity.

And part of his advantage is that he doesn't feel compelled to cover a lot of old ground -- to repeat the lore of academic philosophy.

I will eagerly reread Beyond Technique now, too, which is of similar quality.

A wise, learned, and generally excellent introduction to the background and varieties of Existentialist thought. Anyone interested in the philosophical roots and development of Existentialism should start with this book; it's all here. I concur with other reviewers who have enumerated the virtues of the book, so rather than repeat what they have written I will describe the few negatives that kept me from giving the book 5 stars. But none of these cavils should deter anyone with an interest in Existentialism from buying the book.

Having been written in the late 1950s, the book sometimes shows its age. For example, psychoanalysis was still taken seriously in those days, at least among the literati, and it is given credence here as an illuminating paradigm; but the disputes between Freud, Adler, and Jung are of little interest today. The book's numerous allusions to looming nuclear annihilation are a relic of those "duck and cover" times, and Barrett's repeated criticism of American culture for its materialism, pace, and emphasis on technology, and of Americans for being less philosophically sophisticated than the Europeans, are hackneyed.

Barrett is obviously a fan of Existentialism, and the writing is sometimes overwrought, with too many concepts and ideas described as `momentous', `crucial', `powerful', `urgent', `profound', and so forth. Part of the problem here is that the fundamental ideas of the Existentialists have become part of the culture during the last 50 years, and they no longer strike today's reader as particularly earth-shattering. Some of that space should have been used to explain basic ideas more clearly. Barrett could have done a better job of elucidating the Problem of Nihilism, for example.

The book is also less than forthcoming about the political background of some of the protagonists. The chapters on Kierkegaard and Nietzsche contain good biographical detail and specific information about how these men's ideas were reflected in their lives. But there is none of that, suddenly, when we get to Heidegger and Sartre. About Heidegger's background we are told only that he was "of peasant stock, strongly attached to his native region of southern Germany, and one feels this attachment to the soil in his thinking". Blood and Soil? That's appropriate, since Heidegger was an enthusiastic and active supporter of the Nazis during World War II. Did his philosophy cause him to turn to Nazism? Or was it just the inducement of the university rectorship the Nazis gave him? This well-known history is nowhere analyzed, mentioned, or hinted at by Barrett.

In the chapter on Sartre, we learn that "The Resistance came to Sartre and his generation as a release from disgust into heroism" and that "The experience of the Resistance gave the figure of Descartes even greater importance since in the Resistance Cartesianism could be incarnated in the life of action". That makes it sound like Sartre was an active and heroic member of the Resistance, when he was nothing of the kind. Andre Malraux (whom Barrett criticizes for his "military metaphors"!) pointed out with some bitterness that while he was facing the Gestapo as a member of the Resistance forces, Sartre was safely advancing his career in Paris by putting on plays and doing his writing under the auspices of the German censors. Paul Johnson notes that the emphasis on Heidegger in Sartre's work gave him a leg up with the Nazis, and he had no trouble getting his work published and his plays presented. Satre himself said that "We have never been so free as we were under the German occupation". These facts might have provided the context for a useful discussion of the ethical content and implications of Existentialism, but they are passed over in silence.

If you want an introduction into existential philosophy this book is the one you want to read. Barrett is very engaging and succeeds in giving a surprisingly clear definition of existentialism. The book also shows how relevant existential philosophy still is even today - with alienation such a persuasive feature in contemporary society existentialism may be more prevalent now than ever. Popular movies like American Beauty and Fight Club with their common themes of existential angst and despair make this book more relevant now that when it was first written. The roots of existential philosophy are also discussed in the book. In the chapter on Hebraism and Hellenism it is claimed that Plato is responsible for the division of nature into two realms -- the ideas (universals) and the phenomenal (individual). This gave all changing particulars a shadowy existence that was only half real (at best). existential philosophy is basically a rebellion against this devaluation, brought about by Plato, of human existence. Existentialism is an attempt to place man back -where he was prior to the Greek 'invention' of reason- as the locus of the manifestation of Being. Whether Plato actually made a separation between two worlds or whether he was talking about the one world of nature in two different ways - like noetic and visible places are both places in the same natural world - is not mentioned. Also, in the same chapter, it is said that the Hebrews hadn't permitted a separation of the soul from the body - selective Biblical quotes from the book of Job and Psalm 22 are given to support this - but there are also parts of the old testament that refute that clam: Deuteronomy 18:11, Is 14:9 and Lev 19:31. Anyway, the major strength of the book comes from the 4 chapters on the existentialist philosophers themselves - Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger and Sartre. As an introduction into existentialism Irrational Man is well worth the money.

I'm only a beginner in educating myself on philosophy, but Barret has a brilliant, balanced overview of the defining philosophers of our time, and the thought that produced them: Kirkegaard, Neitzche, Heidegger, and Sartre. I had trouble setting the book down once I started reading.