Resistentialism

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The resistentialism is the parody of a theory . He assumes inanimate things hostile behavior towards people, such as lost keys, escaping rubber balls and the like. Ä. The term was coined by the humorist Paul Jennings , who published a text in The Spectator in 1948 with the title "Report on Resistentialism".

Resistentialism sees itself as a parody of existentialism , especially of Jean-Paul Sartre , accordingly Jennings names a fictional French, Pierre-Marie Ventre, as the alleged founder of the theory. The motto of the Resistentialists is "Les choses sont contre nous" (French: "Things are against us").

Friedrich Theodor Vischer drafted a similar concept, known as the problem of the object , as early as 1878 in his novel Auch Eine. A travel acquaintance . In it, the bizarre "AE" is in constant guerrilla warfare with all sorts of unruly everyday objects.

The idea of ​​hostile objects also appears in the Discworld novels by the English author Terry Pratchett , where the phenomenon is called English malignity or malignance . The author cites garden hoses as an example, which - no matter how carefully you roll them up and store them - roll up again overnight and tie the bicycle to the lawnmower with Gordian knots.

The American author Thomas Pynchon also deals with the polarity of animate and inanimate objects. In his novel V. the protagonist is convinced that he can only deal successfully with living objects. Throughout the novel, the dividing line between animate and inanimate things becomes blurred, to the point of alligators who are convinced that their purpose was to serve as children's toys.

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