Alexander Nehamas

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Alexander Nehamas (Αλέξανδρος Νεχαμάς, born March 22, 1946 in Athens ) is a Greek-born professor of philosophy and comparative literature who currently teaches at Princeton University . His research focuses on Greek philosophy - especially Socrates and Plato - Friedrich Nietzsche and Michel Foucault as well as aesthetics and literary theory . Nehamas is a Spanish citizen but lives and works in the United States.

Nehamas graduated from Swarthmore College in 1967 with a Bachelor of Arts and received his doctorate in Princeton in 1971 under Gregory Vlastos on Plato's Phaidon ( Predication and the Theory of Forms in the Phaedo ). He then taught at the University of Pittsburgh until 1986 , where he became Professor of Philosophy in 1981, and from 1986 to 1990 at Pennsylvania University . He has been a professor at Princeton since 1990. In 2016 he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society .

His Nietzsche book "Nietzsche: Life as Literature" from 1985, which has since been translated into nine languages ​​and had a major influence on the recent American reception of Nietzsche, was particularly successful . Together with Paul Woodruff he created annotated translations of Plato's Phaedrus and Symposium . Nehamas sees philosophy as a means of the art of living . In Only a Promise of Happiness , Nehamas sets out his view of the concept of beauty and its relationship to art , with the title itself - with reference to Stendhal - being developed as a definition of beauty (p. 63 ibid.). In this view, beauty is only linked to art insofar as a work of art can be beautiful just like any other object (p. 95 ibid.). In this sense, Nehamas sees a potential for beauty in a modern mass medium such as television (p. 127 ff. Ibid.).

In 1994 Nehamas was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .

Works

  • Nietzsche: Life as Literature . Harvard University Press, Cambridge 1985.
    • German: Nietzsche: life as literature . Steidl, Göttingen 1991 (2nd edition 1996), ISBN 3-88243-408-2 .
  • The Art of Living: Socratic Reflections from Plato to Foucault . University of California Press, Berkeley 1998.
    • German: The art of living. Socratic reflections from Plato to Foucault . Rotbuch Verlag, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-434-53057-6 .
  • Virtues of Authenticity: Essays on Plato and Socrates . Princeton University Press, Princeton 1999.
  • Only A Promise of Happiness: The Place of Beauty in a World of Art . Princeton University Press, Princeton 2007.
  • About friendship . dtv, Munich 2017, ISBN 978-3-423-43193-4 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Nehamas, Alexander
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH March 22, 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Athens , Greece