Laughing at Nothing: Humor as a Response to Nihilism

Contents

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, vii INTRODUCTION THE PROBLEM OF NIHILISM, 1 PART I SCRU T INIZING NI H ILISM CHAPTER ONE GERMAN AND RUSSIAN NIHILISM, 15 German Nihilism, 15 Russian Nihilism, 17 CHAPTER TWO NIETZSCHEAN NIHILISM, 21 The Christian, the Anarchist, and Socrates, 22 Apollo and Dionysus, 24 Healthy Culture and the Well-Ordered Society, 27 Ascent, Decline, and the Eternal Return of the Same, 30 Heidegger and Nietzsche, 34 CHAPTER THREE WORLD-WAR AND POSTWAR NIHILISM, 43 The National Socialists, 44 Camus and the Existentialists, 46 Yukio Mishima and Asian Nihilism, 50 Nihilism in America, 55 Contents CHAPTER FOUR NIHILISTIC INCONGRUITY, 61 The Descriptive, Normative, and Fatalistic Premises of Nihilism, 68 The Historical Complication, 74 Pyrrho, Stirner, Rorty, and Skeptical Pragmatism, 78 PART II DECLINE, ASCENT, AND H UMOR CHAPTER FIVE DECLINE, DECAY, AND FALLING AWAY, 91 CHAPTER SIX AMBITION, ASPIRATION, AND ASCENT, 105 CHAPTER SEVEN HUMOR AND INCONGRUITY, 123 Jokes, 136 Comedy, 138 Humor, 141 CONCLUSION HUMOR AS A RESPONSE TO NIHILISM, 155 POSTSCRIPT, 167 NOTES, 173 BIBLIOGRAPHY, 195 INDEX, 203 vi LAUGHING AT NOTHING ...