Princeton University Press in partnership with the Romanian Cultural Institute launch the book An intellectual history of cannibalism, written by Catalin Avramescu and translated by Alistair Ian Blyth. The author will be on hand to sign books.
"This provocative history of ideas traces the cannibal's appearance throughout Western thought, first as a creature springing from the menagerie of natural law, later as a diabolical retort to theological dogmas about the resurrection of the body, and finally to present-day social, ethical, and political debates in which the cannibal is viewed through the lens of anthropology or invoked in the service of moral relativism. ...the story of the birth of modernity and of the philosophies of culture that arose in the wake of the Enlightenment. It is a book that lays bare the darker fears and impulses that course through the Western intellectual tradition". Princeton University Press
The book has been reviewed in Times Higher Education by Professor Simon Blackburn (University of Cambridge), in London Review of Books, by Jenny Diski, and in Standpoint, by Noel Malcolm.
Catalin Avramescu is reader of political science at the University of Bucharest and docent at the Department of Social and Moral Philosophy, University of Helsinki. He is member of the editorial board at the Sfera Politicii magazine and of the Group for Social Dialogue (GDS). Catalin Avramescu translated several books: The Social Contract or Principles of Political Right by Jean Jacques Rousseau, Elements of Law, Natural and Political by Thomas Hobbes, Political Essays by David Hume and Hegel by Peter Singer. He also published Finitude and Disorder in the Social Contract Theory from Hobbes to Rousseau (1998).
Endorsements: "In intellectual history, cannibals stand for alien and exotic human beings, specimens of our species who realize its darkest possibilities, usually in places far removed from civilization. Cannibalism both expresses natural law and contravenes it. Avramescu's book is a tour de force. It explains not only why the figure of the cannibal used to be ubiquitous in moral philosophy, but why it has become extinct." Tom Sorell, University of Birmingham
"In this brilliant book, Catalin Avramescu reexamines the Western tradition of social and political thought, restoring our obsession with cannibalism to its proper place in the European imagination. His erudition is overwhelming as he traces the figure of the cannibal, both fascinating and horrifying, through the period when the modern world was being born. Avramescu shows us our history and ourselves in a completely original and gripping way. An Intellectual History of Cannibalism is a real tour de force." Daniel Garber, Princeton University
"Avramescu's wonderful study treats the cannibal as a scholarly creature who animates theoretical texts. Avramescu provides his readers with a comprehensive view of the various theories and visions of cannibalism. There is no book quite like this. Cannibalism is at the extreme limit of human thought and language. Avramescu allows us to see why, and he does it very well." Timo Airaksinen, author of The Philosophy of the Marquis de Sade
When: 28 October 2009, 7 pm
Where: Romanian Cultural Institute.
Admission: free.