Themes out of School: Effects and Causes

by Stanley Cavell

In the first essay of this book, Stanley Cavell characterizes philosophy as a "willingness to think not about something other than what ordinary human beings think about, but rather to learn to think undistractedly about things that ordinary human beings cannot help thinking about, or anyway cannot help having occur to them, sometimes in fantasy, sometimes as a flash across a landscape."

Fantasies of film and television and literature, flashes across the landscape of literary theory, philosophical discourse, and French historiography give Cavell his starting points in these twelve essays. Here is philosophy in and out of "school," understood as a discipline in itself or thought through the works of Shakespeare, Molière, Kierkegaard, Thoreau, Brecht, Makavejev, Bergman, Hitchcock, Astaire, and Keaton.

Genres: Philosophy

282 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1900

About the author

Stanley Cavell was an American philosopher. He was the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard University. He worked in the fields of ethics, aesthetics, and ordinary language philosophy. As an interpreter, he produced influential works on Wittgenstein, Austin, Emerson, Thoreau, and Heidegger. His work is characterized by its conversational tone and frequent literary references.

Reviews

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many of Cavell's "themes" discuss the philosophy of popular culture and especially media. But there is an excellent one about existentialism and logical positivism which I really enjoyed. Stanley Cavell admires both Thoreau and Wittgenstein men who really do not have much in common, but I guess that makes for interesting conversation.

[Blair · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. I love how Cavell makes philosophy ordinary, the ordinary philosophical. Here's how he describes the task during the first essay. I like that the Goodreads review had this in it too - it opened me up to the philosophical everyday, almost zen-like:
"willingness to think not about something other than what ordinary human beings think about, but rather to learn to think undistractedly about things that ordinary human beings cannot help thinking about, or anyway cannot help having occur to them, sometimes in fantasy, sometimes as a flash across a landscape."
And he does it with film! My favourite is the essay on North By Northwest.

[Ryan James Tutak · Rating 4 out of 5]

The essay on "North by Northwest" deems Grant the right choice for the Wrong Man in tracing origins of his role to a species of films immortalizing him: the innocent reach for a rotten 'appel' (its core 'appelant' Kaplan) endangers his character in Hitchcock's thriller, and Cavell finds the fitness for survival in the bid for knowledge a Saint incarnates in Eve.