
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
About this book
'Philosopher Simon Critchley's painstaking attempt to explore transcendent experience provides a fascinating overview of Christianity's great outliers' 'Book of the Day', Guardian 'A playful, profound new study of mysticism... generous and animated' Brian Dillon Mysticism is about existential ecstasy - an experience of heightening one's senses and self into a sheer feeling of aliveness. Mystical experiences offer us a practical way to open our thoughts and deepen the sense of our lives, whether through a mainstream connection to God or by taking part in mind-altering experiences. Here, Simon Critchley explores the history and practice of mysticism, from its origins in Eastern and Western religion, through its association with esoteric and occult knowledge, and up to the ecstatic modernism of T.S. Eliot and others. Through a discussion of the lives of famous mystics, like Julian of Norwich and Jesus Christ, Critchley reveals how embracing the spectrum of mystical experience can refresh our thinking and help us live deeper and freer lives.Philosophical and playful, analytical and inventive, On Mysticism is a definitive account of humanity's quest to understand the divine, and a call to thinkers everywhere to broaden our minds to life larger than our selves.
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Information
Table of contents
- Cover
- Halftitle Page
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- Plague Bill
- The Abdication of Ecstasy
- Brief Lives of Sixteen Mystics
- PART ONE
- Introduction
- 1. Mysticism’s Difficult Definition
- 2. Seven Adverbs That God Loveth
- 3. Released Existence
- PART TWO
- Introduction
- 1. Anne Carson
- 2. Julian of Norwich
- 3. Annie Dillard
- 4. England and Nowhere. Never and Always
- PART THREE
- Confession
- Notes on Sources
- Thanks
- Images
- Bibliography
- Index