The Book of Dead Philosophers

December 8, 2008
According to Cicero, “to philosophize is to learn how to die.” Critchley (Infinitely Demanding
) illustrates this claim in his portraits of the deaths of more than 190 philosophers from the ancients to the analytics of the mid–20th century. A primer on just about every notable philosophical figure in history, this book challenges readers to learn from the philosophers' conduct in life and the circumstances of their deaths. Confucius believed that mourning underscored the value of life; accordingly, his followers grieved his death for at least three years. Thoreau, Emerson and John Stuart Mill died of ordinary ailments while relishing the natural world. Aquinas found serenity contemplating the bough of a tree, fitting consolation for the philosopher who preached the interconnectedness of nature and the soul. Dionysius spent the second half of his life rejecting Stoicism and embracing hedonism yet committed a protracted suicide by voluntary starvation. David Hume proved that atheists could die happy. The book offers an interpretation of death's potential as a final artistic and intellectual endeavor; it is a witty and generous gift that will leave readers perhaps a little less afraid of death and more appreciative of life.

January 15, 2009
Critchley (philosophy, New Sch. for Social Research; "Infinitely Demanding: Ethics of Commitment, Politics of Resistance") maintains that people today are terrified by death: we fear total annihilation. Philosophers, most famously Socrates, have claimed to be able to accept death, and Critchley thinks that by studying how various philosophers have approached death, we can to some extent relieve our anxiety about it. He accordingly presents over 190 brief accounts of how philosophers have died. Some philosophers, like Montaigne, have indeed looked at death without fear, and Simone Weil died through ascetic practices that amounted to voluntary starvation. Critchley, as one would expect from a leading postmodernist, allows his book to escape from its ostensible thesis. Much of the book consists of anecdotes, often mordantly funny, such as students playing football with Jeremy Bentham's head. Sartre, close to the end, asked, "How are we going to manage the funeral expenses?" Critchley on occasion expresses his own views, e.g., he finds part of Heidegger's account of death "false and morally pernicious." Highly recommended for general and philosophy collections.David Gordon, Bowling Green State Univ., OH

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from January 1, 2009
Dismayed by the devolution of philosophy into a dry academic specialty, Critchley reconnects his discipline with the most universal of human concerns. For it is in pondering death that serious thinkers have discovered the wellsprings of wisdom. Seneca is thus voicing a persistent philosophical motif when he insists, He will live badly who does not know how to die well. However, because death refuses to shrink into a tidy intellectual construct, Critchley scrutinizes not only what prominent philosophers have thought about the subject but also how they have actually died. Readers thus contemplate the dying Augustine reading the Hebrew psalms in tears; the doomed Nietzsche rushing into the street to embrace a horse, so signaling a final descent into syphilitic madness; the heroic Bergson contracting his fatal illness by voluntarily joining fellow Jews forced into the bitter cold of midwinter to register with Nazi authorities. Scholars may complain about the scrapbook style of (dis)organization, as the deaths and death thoughts of almost 200 philosophers pass in quick review. But most readers will recognize the aptness of the rapid-fire summary, each entry a piquant reminder of the brevity of life and a forceful rejection of the illusions of intellectual progress. A work that makes philosophy matter again.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)