Category Archives: existentialism
The truth and grace, 2: Beneficence
This is the second of three essays on grace. The three parts move through different aspects of grace—reason, beneficence, and the unknown—roaming across Sartre, the epistles of St. Paul, Flannery O’Connor, Roberto Bolaño, and Nassim Nicholas Taleb The Road to … Continue reading
Filed under existentialism, freedom, hubris, ideas, individuality, Jean-Paul Sartre, life, literature, truth
The truth and grace, 1: Reason
This is the first of three essays on grace. The three parts move through three aspects of grace—reason, beneficence, and the unknown—roaming across existentialism, Sartre, the epistles of St. Paul, Flannery O’Connor, Roberto Bolaño, and Nassim Nicholas Taleb. A Reason … Continue reading
Filed under existentialism, freedom, hubris, ideas, individuality, Jean-Paul Sartre, literature, order, philosophy, truth, vanity
The truth and narrative, 3: my life with Roberto Bolaño
1987 I met Gondim in Rio de Janeiro in 1987. He brought me to Morro dos Prazeres, a favela whose name translates into English as “Hill of Pleasures.” We took the streetcar from downtown up to the neighborhood of Santa … Continue reading
Filed under brasil, Brazil, existentialism, fiction, freedom, ideas, life, literature, love, philosophy, truth, writing
The truth and narrative, 2: my life with Julio Cortázar
In the midst of my Greenean visions, fueled from the outset by Pulling’s trip from Buenos Aires to Asunción, I picked up a novel called The Winners at my local bookstore. I was still in college, and I hadn’t met … Continue reading
Filed under art, brasil, Brazil, existentialism, freedom, ideas, life, literature, truth, writing
E/F – The glass of art
A friend of mine told me about a playwriting workshop he attended some years ago. The instructor was David Mamet, and after the lecture someone asked Mamet what made him a great playwright. “I write plays, and you don’t,” was … Continue reading
Filed under art, evolution, existentialism, ideas, philosophy, poetry, truth, vanity, writing
The truth and fearlessness
My God has sent his angel and closed the lions’ mouths so that they have not hurt me. Daniel 6:23 Of those who are fearless, there two kinds: the reckless and the serene. The reckless attract more followers, for they … Continue reading
E/F – The glass of life
God looked at everything he had made, and he found it very good (Genesis 1:31). Life is full of contradiction, and so are attempts to understand where life came from, why we are here, and what will become of us. … Continue reading
Filed under ageing, body, entropy, existentialism, freedom, life, philosophy, truth
The truth and every purpose
There is an appointed time for everything, and a time for every affair under the heavens. A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to uproot the plant. A time to … Continue reading
Filed under beauty, death, existentialism, freedom, ideas, life, Park Slope, philosophy, truth, vanity
The truth and amoebas
Your body isn’t your own, exposed for all it really is: permeable, full of holes, part of the world. A floating thing tossed and spit on tumbling water not always clear, you become home to others, little animals here at … Continue reading
The truth and Brasília, 2: Torsos of Steel
The Dream From 1956 to 1960, Brazilian architects, engineers and peasant laborers called candangos built a new capital, Brasília. This was the realization of a dream first voiced in 1827, just 5 years after the country became independent, when an … Continue reading
