Description
Book SynopsisWillow Verkerk is a Lecturer in Continental Philosophy and Social Philosophy at the University of British Columbia, Canada and a researcher with the Gendered Mimesis Project at KU Leuven, Belgium.
Trade ReviewNietzsche valued friendship, and this pioneering study shows how Nietzsche’s own discussion of friendship is absolutely crucial for understanding his philosophy. Through a very careful and perceptive reading of Nietzsche’s texts, Verkerk argues that Nietzsche’s ideas about friendship are empowering – and in this way she makes a strong case for the relevance of Nietzsche’s thought in contemporary debates concerning friendship, gender relations, and love. * Richard White, Professor of Philosophy, Creighton University, USA *
“We were friends and have become estranged. (…) We are two ships each of which has its goal and course. (…) Perhaps we shall meet again but fail to recognize each other: our exposure to different seas and suns has changed us!”, says Nietzsche in
The Gay Science. Attentive to all possible meanings of such a change, Verkerk explores with remarkable scrutiny the singular destiny of friendship, which reveals its metamorphic power only after it has died — posthumous birth of new identities. -- Catherine Malabou, Professor of Philosophy, Kingston University, UK
Table of ContentsIntroduction Chapter 1: Nietzsche’s Literary Gift of Friendship: Reading Nietzsche as a Joyful, Agonistic, and Bestowing Friend Chapter 2: Nietzsche’s Re-evaluation of Friendship Chapter 3: On Becoming What One Is: Nietzsche’s Therapeutic Concept of the Self Chapter 4: Nietzsche and Aristotle on Character, Virtue, and the Limits of Friendship Chapter 5: Women, Love, and the Gendered Troubles of Friendship in Nietzsche and Irigaray Chapter 6: Abducting Woman? An Agonistic Reception of Nietzsche’s (and Derrida’s) Gifts Conclusion: Further Re-evaluations Notes References Index
