Philosophy Ancient & Classical
The Birth of Reason
- Publisher
- DC Books
- Initial publish date
- Nov 1994
- Category
- Ancient & Classical
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780919688414
- Publish Date
- Nov 1994
- List Price
- $32.95
-
Hardback
- ISBN
- 9780919688438
- Publish Date
- Nov 1994
- List Price
- $29.95
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Description
In The Birth of Reason Louis Dudek establishes the link between ancient pre-Socratic Atomism and modern quantum mechanics. In characteristically unencumbered terms, Dudek shows how this revolutionary philosophy, the invention of thinkers from Ioanian Greek trading cities, has been consistently misrepresented and resisted. Atomism nevertheless marks the transition from primitive mythological thinking (mythos) to the abstract, concept-based rationality (logos) that informs our modern approach to an ultimately unknowable reality.
This essay "is a kind of summation of myself - gnothi seaut'Äîn.... I am neither a materialist nor a theist, really, nor am I altogether an agnostic. As I say in [the] essay, 'the ultimate reality is unknowable,' but I am sure that if it were knowable it would satisfy both the materialist and the theist, and much more that we cannot imagine."
"If anyone could make the Ionian skeptics palatable to a generation raised on music and television, it's Louis Dudek." - The Ottawa Citizen
"...the highlight is ... 39 fragments from the pre-Socratics that Dudek astutely describes as reading 'like a philosophical poem.'" - The Montreal Gazette
"...includes the thesis that the scientific conception of the universe ... is the most advanced stage of religious evolution." - Canadian Book Review Annual
About the author
Karis Shearer is currently a doctoral candidate at The University of Western Ontario, where she is completing her dissertation on postmodern cultural workers and the Canadian long poem. She has published articles on women’s writing and the poetry of Lynn Crosbie, and has guest-edited an issue of Open Letter on new Canadian fiction writers.
Louis Dudek was one of Canada’s most important and influential cultural workers. After gaining his PhD from Columbia University, Dudek in 1951 returned from New York to Montreal, the city of his birth, to take up a position as professor of English at McGill. Dudek’s return to Canada marked the beginning of his efforts to revolutionize the Montreal poetry scene through little magazines and small-press publishing, providing alternatives to commercial presses and opportunities for talented young poets. In 1956 he started The McGill Poetry Series, which gave a start to several young poets, including Leonard Cohen. The author of numerous books of poetry, Louis Dudek died in 2001.
Frank Davey has been a poet, editor, small-magazine publisher, literary critic, and cultural critic in Canada since 1961. He is editor and co-founder of the influential poetry newsletter Tish (1961-63) and since 1965 editor of Open Letter, the Canadian journal of writing and theory. With Fred Wah in 1984, he founded SwiftCurrent, the world’s first online literary magazine, and operated it until 1990. His more than forty books include Louis Dudek and Raymond Souster (1980), The Abbotsford Guide to India (1986), Reading Canadian Reading (1988), Canadian Literary Power (1994), and Back to the War (2005).
Editorial Reviews
"If anyone could make the Ionian skeptics palatable to a generation raised on music and television, its Louis Dudek." -- The Ottawa Citizen "...the highlight is ... 39 fragments from the pre-Socratics that Dudek astutely describes as reading like a philosophical poem." -- The Montreal Gazette "...includes the thesis that the scientific conception of the universe ... is the most advanced stage of religious evolution." -- Canadian Book Review Annual
Other titles by
Making of Modern Poetry in Canada
Essential Commentary on Poetry in English, Third edition
The Making of Modern Poetry in Canada
Essential Commentary on Poetry in English, Third edition
Literature and the Press
All These Roads
The Poetry of Louis Dudek
The Poetry of Louis Dudek
Definitive Collection