Ars Vitae

Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn

Description

Despite the flood of self-help guides and our current therapeutic culture, feelings of alienation and spiritual longing continue to grip modern society. In this book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn offers a fresh solution: a return to classic philosophy and the cultivation of an inner life.

The ancient Roman philosopher Cicero wrote that philosophy is ars vitae, the art of living. Today, signs of stress and duress point to a full-fledged crisis for individuals and communities while current modes of making sense of our lives prove inadequate. Yet, in this time of alienation and spiritual longing, we can glimpse signs of a renewed interest in ancient approaches to the art of living.

In this ambitious and timely book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn engages both general readers and scholars on the topic of well-being. She examines the reappearance of ancient philosophical thought in contemporary American culture, probing whether new stirrings of Gnosticism, Stoicism, Epicureanism, Cynicism, and Platonism present a true alternative to our current therapeutic culture of self-help and consumerism, which elevates the self’s needs and desires yet fails to deliver on its promises of happiness and healing. Do the ancient philosophies represent a counter-tradition to today’s culture, auguring a new cultural vibrancy, or do they merely solidify a modern way of life that has little use for inwardness—the cultivation of an inner life—stemming from those older traditions? Tracing the contours of this cultural resurgence and exploring a range of sources, from scholarship to self-help manuals, films, and other artifacts of popular culture, this book sees the different schools as organically interrelated and asks whether, taken together, they can point us in important new directions.

Ars Vitae sounds a clarion call to take back philosophy as part of our everyday lives. It proposes a way to do so, sifting through the ruins of long-forgotten and recent history alike for any shards helpful in piecing together the coherence of a moral framework that allows us ways to move forward toward the life we want and need.

It is understandable that people would turn to comforting nostrums for help. But we need to consult something more elaborate than a single saying on a mug extracted from the context of its larger vision. What if the saying, shorn of that broader view, turns out to be inscrutable right when we need it most? We could end up doing the very opposite of what the words intended and find ourselves tangled up in something worse than where we started. Prodded by anxiety or mere curiosity, we encounter oceans of advice telling us how to live or what to make of life. It is a free country with a free(ish) market. The self-help industry is no exception. It is basically a free-for-all. Anyone hanging out a shingle can dispense advice, which can mean the publication of self-help books by major publishers and vanity presses, with Amazon enabling authors whose only qualification is the ability to compose words into sentences. Shingles include websites, blogs, advice columns, college classes, and consulting firms. Luck, pluck, and marketing allow self-help Horatio Algers to ply their trade unchallenged. In a world of short attention spans, any kind of follow up on the effects of the advice is nonexistent.

This is not to suggest we need more studies. Only willed ignorance would suggest as much. Sadly, the evidence is in. Rates of depression, anxiety, addiction, and suicide have reached epidemic proportions. On arguably the most important question we face—how to live—there is little concerted effort to think through the assumptions or results of one plan versus another or to admit that we are in dire straits, not just as persons but as a people.

In this anarchy of advice, we could call for tighter regulations and more professional training. Yet most professionals are these days mainly trained in techniques of what is called service delivery. Between the vast needs they face and the failure of insurance companies to cover extensive counseling or preventive medicine, they tend to be experts in pharmaceuticals or crisis intervention. Even when licensed for some form of talk therapy, certification does not automatically ensure wisdom. It does not generally include education in a deep understanding of ways to think about life’s meaning, alternative intellectual approaches to living, and the question of which practices are better for us and why. The best counselor, whether parent, pastor, friend, teacher, or therapist, must eventually send someone off to become master of his or her life. Everything hinges on the content of the advice, or the quality of ideas encountered elsewhere about how to live.

In New York Magazine’s “Self-Help Issue,” Kathryn Schulz argues that, despite the huge number of self-help books out now, all self-help literature comes down to the same thing, what she calls “the master theory of self-help”:

It goes like this: Somewhere below or above or beyond the part of you that is struggling with weight loss or procrastination or whatever your particular problem might be, there is another part of you that is immune to that problem and capable of solving it for the rest of you. In other words, this master theory is fundamentally dualist. It posits, at a minimum, two selves: one that needs a kick in the ass and one that is capable of kicking.

This is a helpful observation for moving us beyond such simplistic binaries. Yet for Schulz, given the lack of a clear understanding of the self—something she thinks we cannot reach anyway—self-help has equal standing with any other safe and legal means the individual can use to overcome depression or other emotional challenges: “Try something. Better still, try everything—throw all the options at the occluding wall of the self and see what sticks. Meditation, marathon training, fasting, freewriting, hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, speed dating, volunteering, moving to Auckland, redecorating the living room.”

Schulz’ entertaining call to action—any action—aside, all activities one might choose to engage in do not share a moral equivalence. Looking more closely at self-help offerings, along with a full range of other cultural expressions, reveals vital differences in both content and quality. Identifying the nature of the particular framework at hand can get us into more promising territory for those seeking deeper answers. If ideas matter, then in the course of offering advice, self-help literature has a significant role in shaping what we think are the possibilities of our lives, especially if increasingly purveyed in additional forms and genres outside of self-help. We need to admit that it is time we call our popular culture—from movies to internet sites—what it really is: popular education.

Major Abbreviations and Sources

Acknowledgements

Introduction: Therapeia

1. The New Gnosticism

2. The New Stoicism

3. The New Epicureanism

4. The New Cynicism

5. The New Platonism

Conclusion: Philosophia

Epilogue: Once

Bibliography

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Éthique et morale
• Philosophie de la psychologie
• Philosophie antique
• Santé et bien-être
• Bien-être émotionnel
• Bien-être émotionnel
• Moral Philosophy
• Personal Growth
• Modern
• HISTORY
• PHILOSOPHY
• Philosophie et théologie
• Stoicism
• Cynicism
• Education in ancient Greece
• Greco-Roman world
• Platonism
• Modern history
• Epicureanism
• Gnosticism
• Ethics
• 21st Century
• Happiness
• Social
• Obermodern-Zutzendorf

Informations

• Publié par: University of Notre Dame Press
• Date de parution: 15 octobre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780268108915
• Langue: English

Extrait

ADVANCE PRAISE
for
Ars Vitae: The Fate of Inwardness and the Return of the Ancient Arts of Living
“At a time when we are all too aware of the absence of a web of meaning to guide our life, it helps to draw on the moral resources provided by what Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn calls the ‘ancient arts of living.’ She takes us on a philosophical journey to give us insights into the predicament we face in our inward life. After reading her beautifully written Ars Vitae, you, too, will want to embark on such a journey.”
—Frank Furedi, author of Why Borders Matter
“An astute archeologist of ideas, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn spies the finest remnants of our classical past lurking within the motley mess of contemporary life. In Ars Vitae, she reminds us, as Faulkner once did, that the past is not dead and that the old Greco-Roman approaches to the art of living still constellate our thoughts and customize our actions, consciously or not.”
—David Bosworth, author of Conscientious Thinking
“In Ars Vitae, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn provides a new way for us to think about the ways in which modern Americans strive to find meaning in, and strive to realize the potential of, their lives. The book sets into relief the peculiar ways in which Americans grasp at the question of how to live and ultimately calls for a new inwardness in American life. This is a masterwork of a book.”
—Susan McWilliams Barndt, author of
The American Road Trip and American Political Thought
“With impressive learning and admirable literary grace, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn calls on us to take seriously again what Cicero called ‘the art of living.’ Drawing on a range of classical thinkers and schools, she demonstrates how true inwardness and self-knowledge are the antidotes to shallow consumerism and a narcissistic preoccupation with the self. This is a gem of a book, scholarship at the service of self-understanding and the search for truth.”
—Daniel J. Mahoney, author of
The Conservative Foundations of Liberal Order
“Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn displays here an amazing familiarity with a vast and technical scholarly literature on ancient philosophy—not only on its relevance to everyday life in present-day America. Her understanding of such sources is juxtaposed with her insight into present-day popular culture—it’s all quite astonishing. If ever a book deserved publishing, it is this one.”
—Daniel Walker Howe, Pulitzer Prize-winning author
of What Hath God Wrought
ARS
VITAE
ARS
VITAE

The Fate of
Inwardness and the
Return of the Ancient
Arts of Living
ELISABETH LASCH-QUINN
UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME PRESS
NOTRE DAME, INDIANA
University of Notre Dame Press
Notre Dame, Indiana 46556
undpress.nd.edu
Copyright © 2020 by Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn
All Rights Reserved
Published in the United States of America
Library of Congress Control Number: 2020940870
ISBN: 978-0-268-10889- 2 (Hardback)
ISBN: 978-0-268-10892-2 (WebPDF)
ISBN: 978-0-268-10891-5 (Epub)
This e-Book was converted from the original source file by a third-party vendor. Readers who notice any formatting, textual, or readability issues are encouraged to contact the publisher at [e-mail]
This book was selected as the 2020 Giles Family Fund Recipient. The University of Notre Dame Press and the author thank the Giles family for their generous support.
GILES FAMILY FUND RECIPIENTS 2019 The Glory and the Burden: The American Presidency from FDR to Trump, Robert Schmuhl 2020 Ars Vitae: The Fate of Inwardness and the Return of the Ancient Arts of Living , Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn
The Giles Family Fund supports the work and mission of the University of Notre Dame Press to publish books that engage the most enduring questions of our time. Each year the endowment helps underwrite the publication and promotion of a book that sparks intellectual exploration and expands the reach and impact of the university.
To my mother
and my husband
with love
CONTENTS Acknowledgments Introduction: Therapeia ONE The New Gnosticism TWO The New Stoicism THREE The New Epicureanism FOUR The New Cynicism FIVE The New Platonism Conclusion: Philosophia Epilogue: Once Notes Bibliography Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To all who helped sustain the writing of this book, Ars Vitae is my expression of gratitude. To me, ars vitae means not just the art of living but your art of living.
Writing about how to live is a delicate matter, and I am grateful to all those who gave me the time, space, and resources to do so. A Fulbright fellowship at the University of Rome III in Italy and a research fellowship from the Religion and Innovation in Human Affairs Program of the Historical Society and John Templeton Foundation were priceless. James Davison Hunter played a pivotal role, with Joseph Davis and Jay Tolson at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia, which provided enriching discussions of my work in progress and a treasured yearlong nonresidential fellowship. At Syracuse University, the History Department, chaired by Michael Ebner and Norman Kutcher, and the Maxwell School provided research support, with a Pellicone faculty fellowship and funding for images and copyright permissions, and the Campbell Public Affairs Institute provided a research grant. Some paragraphs, used here with permission, originally appeared in “The Mind of the Moralist,” in the New Republic, August 28, 2006, 27–31, and “The New Old Ways of Self Help,” in Hedgehog Review 19, no. 1 (Spring 2017).
I am grateful to dear colleagues, doctoral advisees, and other graduate and undergraduate students with whom I have worked most closely. You know who you are. As a modernist, I was fortunate to be able to return to earlier interests with new or renewed study in Italian, Latin, German, French, art history, comparative literature, and the history of Greece and Rome, and seminars with Michael Stocker (on love and on the philosophy of emotion), Patricia Miller (late antique philosophy and religion), Marcia Robinson (Kierkegaard), Albrecht Diem (medieval monasticism), and Craige Champion and Matthieu Van Der Meer (Latin). Deep gratitude goes to the memory of my uncle, classicist Steele Commager, who inspired my love of ancient words and ideas from a young age, and to Cynthia Farber-Soule, Charles Goldberg, Robby Ramdin, Paul Prescott, and the memories of Joseph Levine and Jean Bethke Elshtain for nurturing it. Talks with Bruce Laurie and Catherine Tumber were formative and writing sessions with Michael Fisher and Yoshina Hurgobin generative.
At the places I was invited to present my work in progress, those attending offered insights and inspiration: Albion Tourgée Seminar in Intellectual History at the University of Rochester; Common Ground Initiative, Grand Valley State University, and Conference on Faith and History, Calvin College, both in Grand Rapids, Michigan; Front Porch Republic Conference, Spring Arbor University, Spring Arbor, Michigan; Maxwell Citizenship Initiative/Moynihan Institute Brownbag series, Confession symposium, and Chronos Undergraduate Conference, all at Syracuse University; “The Human Person” work group (which produced Figures in a Carpet ) in Rockport, Massachusetts, and at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, funded by the Pew Foundation; the Political Theory Colloquium, University of Notre Dame; the American Enterprise Institute; the Religion and Innovation in Human Affairs workshop, Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford, UK; the Universita degli Studi di Napoli in Naples, Italy; the Centro Studi Americani in Rome, Italy; and the Conversazioni in Italia symposium in Florence, Italy. Special thanks go to Robert Westbrook, Gleaves Whitney, John Fea, Wilfred McClay, Patrick Deneen, Arthur Brooks, Donald Yerxa, and all of my Italian hosts.
Paul Arras provided Herculean research assistance. Key conversations with Todd Gitlin, Jean Stinchcombe, Robert Corban, Audie Klotz, and Paul Murphy were vital for the project. Director Steve Wrinn, editor of my dreams, made the University of Notre Dame Press ideal for the book, with unparalleled anonymous reviewers. I am grateful to Raj, Rahul, Sonam, Sunny, and others at Dosa Grill who made it the perfect place for much of the writing of Ars Vitae. Ever in memory, my father Christopher Lasch bequeathed lifelong encouragement. My siblings, Robert Lasch, Christopher Lasch, and Catherine Loomis, and their families, offered loving support. My daughters, Isabel and Honoré, provided loving encouragement. My husband, Ray, and my mother, Nell Commager Lasch, gave spirit-saving sustenance in too many forms to mention or even imagine. I wrote this book to an intricate choreography of unheard melodies that surrounded me with a dance of angels.
INTRODUCTION
Therapeia

Philosophia est ars vitae.
—Cicero
Philosophy is the art of living. So wrote the ancient Roman philosopher Cicero during one of the most momentous periods in human history. Centuries after Socrates, in a time of civil wars and Caesar’s rise and fall, Cicero thought the ancient Greek schools of philosophy essential knowledge for Romans. Centuries after Cicero, in our own tumultuous times, we might also benefit from heeding his call to engage more fully in the task of ars vitae . 1
Many today seek help and insight for how to live in hard times and have trouble finding the deep answers that really help. Everywhere we see signs of great distress. Yet all around us we can also find signs, some hidden and some staring us in the face, of a return to ancient approaches to the art of living. Ancient Greco-Roman philosophy, an influence on learning worldwide in fields from poetry to physics, is nothing if not deep. It presupposes inwardness —the cultivation of an inner life—and the centrality of the search for meaning as the paramount human endeavor. Inwardness is the way the self develops the resources necessary for everything from enduring hardship to soaring to the heights of a fulfilled human l