*Forgive any formatting as I’m on mobile.
As I read in themes, I’m currently focusing on philosophy to try and understand it, see where I fit in the world and also reconstruct my own atheist/nihilistic worldview.
I just got done with Existentialist Cafe and got a really nice overview of all the main players in the Existentialist camp but want to finally take the leap into nihilism and absurdism proper. I’ve read The Stranger and Myth of Sisyphus and like Camus a lot so far but also wanna tackle Satre, Beauvoir, and Merleau-Ponty eventually but wonder if I need to read Husserl and specifically Heidegger and Nietzche since they are controversial because of their politics. Would I be able to get away with just reading synopses of their work? I do currently have Being and Time in my list of books to get.
Also, aside from Nietzche, who else should I read regarding nihilism? I’m currently working through The Trouble with Being Born by Cioran and wanna find some more by him but also have The Antidote by Burkeman and Conspiracy Against the Human Race by Ligotti in my backlog. I did read The Book by Alan Watts the other day and though it felt like reading my stoned friend’s wild ramblings on society and how we exist in it, some coherent stuff did come through. But I don’t know if it was what I was after. I did appreciate it for introducing me to some concepts like ego and self but maybe I should have saved it for another day?
Sidenote but I’m planning on moving back and force between philosophy and socialist theory so socialist philosphers are also welcome. Generally I’m open to all suggestions.
Thanks in advance!
Yes, even if you know for a fact that you’ll reject both of them. They’re too important for everything else that happens in continental philosophy. Almost everyone else is responding to them or interpreting them in different ways.
For Heidegger: you can get away with only reading the first division of Being and Time but I’d also prioritize “The Origin of the Work of Art” and “The Question Concerning Technology,” among other pieces included in Heidegger’s Basic Writings. Even if your main question as a reader is “What’s fashy about this ostensibly non-political text?” it’s important. I’m not going to claim it’s necessary for everyone to read him, but since you’re interested in philosophy, you’re already researching existentialism, and you presumably have mountains of leftist books on your reading list that have been influenced, implicitly or explicitly, by Heidegger’s thought - yes, you should read him.
Re: Husserl: I know a few people who’ve read him and I don’t know if any of them recommend the experience. The folk I know who are into phenomenology are much more fond of Merleau-Ponty.
For Nietzsche: Genealogy of Morals is his most straightforward and necessary text. The Birth of Tragedy is great; The Gay Science and Beyond Good and Evil are at least fun to flip through; Twilight of the Idols is an underrated starting point. There are good reasons to loathe Nietzsche and his influence but he’s an absolute all-timer as a writer and aphorist, and if he says something deeply horrible he probably has something that says the exact opposite elsewhere in his corpus. There are lots of ways to read him. For example, he’s obviously a misogynist but there are books out there that offer feminist interpretations of him. Is this ridiculous? Maybe. But there’s a reason he inspires such contortionist versatility in his readers. He contains multitudes.
For Cioran: my favorite is a A Short History of Decay. His first book, written in Romanian, On the Heights of Despair, is frequently excellent. If you’ve read even a bit of Nietzsche you’ll see where Cioran gets it from. I don’t know where else to go for nihilist thinkers, but Eugene Thacker, who does some Cioran introductions, has a book on pessimism (Infinite Resignation) that might direct you to others.