Columbia University Press
The Philosopher's Plant
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Illustrator:
About this book
Author / Editor information
Mathilde Roussel is a French artist and sculptor who has taught and exhibited widely in the United States.
Reviews
All who get a taste of this succulent study will find much food for thought.
Luce Irigaray:
One must give Michael Marder credit for combining the deconstruction of our traditional metaphysics with a focus on the plant world. He invites us to perceive and consider again the presence and the potential of our living environment, the thoughtless use of which has damaged both our life and our culture.
Edward S. Casey, SUNY at Stony Brook, author of The World at a Glance and The World on Edge:
The Philosopher's Plant is an alluring immersion in phytophilia, exploring the thought of philosophers from Plato to Irigaray by way of their intimate reflections on plant life. Not only do we learn much that is subtle and profound about plants but we come to see the work of these thinkers in refreshing new lights. Humor and wit alternate with penetrating philosophical insight in this bouquet of delights.
William Egginton, Johns Hopkins University:
The Philosopher's Plant is a genuine pleasure to read and one of the most innovative books I have encountered in some time. Marder's argument is that contemporary scientific research into how plants communicate, interact with, and possibly even perceive the environment should be enriched by an engagement with how the Western philosophical tradition has already thought and continues thinking the problem of plant life for human being-in-the-world.
Santiago Zabala, ICREA/University of Barcelona:
The Philosopher's Plant is an original contribution to a concept which for too long has been marginalized. As the only contemporary philosopher working on plants from a deconstructive and weak-thought perspective, Marder provides not only another contribution to the philosophical concept of plants in general, but also adds onto his own work.
Claudia Baracchi, Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca:
From the conversation of Socrates and Phaedrus in the shade of the plane tree to Irigaray's meditation on the water lily, The Philosopher's Plant takes us outside city walls, across gardens of letters and vegetables, grassy slopes and vineyards, to the dimly lit sources of philosophy's vitality. With distinctive depth and clarity, Marder reminds us that, far from walled in, the human community communes with nature and is itself inhabited by nature.
Topics
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Frontmatter
i -
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Contents
viii -
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
xi -
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PROLOGUE: HERBARIUM PHILOSOPHICUM
xiii - Part I. Ancient Plant-Souls
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1 / Plato’s Plane Tree
2 -
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2 / Aristotle’s Wheat
21 -
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3 / Plotinus’ Anonymous “Great Plant”
39 - Part II. Medieval Plant-Instruments
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4 / Augustine’s Pears
58 -
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5 / Avicenna’s Celery
79 -
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6 / Maimonides’ Palm Tree
97 - Part III. Modern Plant-Images
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7 / Leibniz’s Blades of Grass
114 -
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8 / Kant’s Tulip
133 -
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9 / Hegel’s Grapes
153 - Part IV. Postmodern Plant-Subjects
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10 / Heidegger’s Apple Tree
172 -
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11 / Derrida’s Sunflowers
193 -
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12 / Irigaray’s Water Lily
213 -
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NOTES
231 -
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
245 -
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INDEX
255