The Joyce Paradox

The Joyce Paradox
Author: Arnold Goldman
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 181
Release: 2015-12-22
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1317292081

First published in 1966. By pursuing a group of cognate themes, the author relates major critical approaches to the fiction of James Joyce. One of the major issues explored is that of the existence of ‘symbols’ in his fiction, and of the quality of Joyce’s feelings shown through an examination of the extent of his human sympathies. This title will be of interest to students of literature.

The Joyce Paradox

The Joyce Paradox
Author: Arnold Goldman
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 193
Release: 2015-12-22
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 131729209X

First published in 1966. By pursuing a group of cognate themes, the author relates major critical approaches to the fiction of James Joyce. One of the major issues explored is that of the existence of ‘symbols’ in his fiction, and of the quality of Joyce’s feelings shown through an examination of the extent of his human sympathies. This title will be of interest to students of literature.

The Paradox of Being

The Paradox of Being
Author: Poul Andersen
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 370
Release: 2021-03-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1684171040

The question of truth has never been more urgent than today, when the distortion of facts and the imposition of pseudo-realities in the service of the powerful have become the order of the day. In The Paradox of Being Poul Andersen addresses the concept of truth in Chinese Daoist philosophy and ritual. His approach is unapologetically universalist, and the book may be read as a call for a new way of studying Chinese culture, one that does not shy away from approaching “the other” in terms of an engagement with “our own” philosophical heritage. The basic Chinese word for truth is zhen, which means both true and real, and it bypasses the separation of the two ideas insisted on in much of the Western philosophical tradition. Through wide-ranging research into Daoist ritual, both in history and as it survives in the present day, Andersen shows that the concept of true reality that informs this tradition posits being as a paradox anchored in the inexistent Way (Dao). The preferred way of life suggested by this insight consists in seeking to be an exception to ordinary norms and rules of behavior which nonetheless engages what is common to us all.

James Joyce's Negations

James Joyce's Negations
Author: Brian Cosgrove
Publisher:
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2007
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN:

The main purpose of this book is to validate a reading of Joyce in negative terms. Central to the enquiry is an examination of the roles of irony and of indeterminacy. Irony, interpreted in metaphysical rather than merely rhetorical terms, is envisaged as deriving from two separate if related orientations, one associated with Friedrich Schlegel, the other with Gustave Flaubert. Insofar as Joyce's work (including "Ulysses") owes more to the latter than the former, it forgoes the genial humour central to Schlegel's theories, and embraces instead the ironic detachment and formal control of a Flaubertian perspective. Such irony (which entails a suspicion of sentiment and a related dehumanisation of character, as in some of the stories in Dubliners) becomes normative in Joyce, and along with a similarly deflationary parody pervades "Ulysses". In addition, a persistent indeterminacy is established as early as 'The Dead', so that it becomes impossible in that story to adjudicate between not just contradictory but mutually exclusive interpretations. Such indeterminacy is pushed to further extremes in "Ulysses", with its notorious proliferation of narrative perspectives.As a corollary to the work's encyclopaedic inclusiveness and quotidian particularism, every detail tends to assume the same significance as every other; the consequence being that (in Gyorgy Lukacs' famous formulation) we lose all sense of any 'hierarchy of meaning'. From that it is but a step to Franco Moretti's assessment that in "Ulysses" everyday existence remains 'inert, opaque - meaningless', and that in fact the whole point is to represent the meaningless precisely 'as meaningless'. Indeterminacy, in effect, ushers in the possibility of nihilism. The analysis of "Ulysses" culminates with the attempt (unavailing in both cases) to discover in either Bloom or Molly a genuine source of countervailing affirmation. The study concludes with a brief consideration of the polysemic vocabulary of "Finnegans Wake" as a logical extrapolation of the poetics of indeterminacy.

The Happiness Paradox the Happiness Paradigm

The Happiness Paradox the Happiness Paradigm
Author: Richard Eyre
Publisher: Workman Publishing
Total Pages: 322
Release: 2019-01-01
Genre: Self-Help
ISBN: 1641701048

New York Times–Bestselling Author: “The message resonates in today’s workaholic culture that rewards hard work and stress with . . . more hard work and stress.” —Deseret News In this book, the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Teaching Your Children Values and The Entitlement Trap, Richard Eyre, contends that the three things today’s society desires most—control, ownership, and independence—are, paradoxically, what bring the most discouragement and unhappiness in our lives. Providing a mind-changing exploration of the inherent problems with our fixation on material possessions, control over our lives, and independence from others, Eyre responds with a unique and engaging counterpoint on how to switch to the joy-giving alternatives of serendipity, stewardship, and interdependence and thus live a more verdant and abundant life. The first half, The Happiness Paradox, explores today’s challenges to happiness. The second half explores The Happiness Paradigm: How A New View Can Turn Your Life Right-Side Up—and walks us through a mental paradigm shift that can change our lives and our search for lasting joy.

The Paradox of Choice

The Paradox of Choice
Author: Barry Schwartz
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2009-10-13
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0061748994

Whether we're buying a pair of jeans, ordering a cup of coffee, selecting a long-distance carrier, applying to college, choosing a doctor, or setting up a 401(k), everyday decisions—both big and small—have become increasingly complex due to the overwhelming abundance of choice with which we are presented. As Americans, we assume that more choice means better options and greater satisfaction. But beware of excessive choice: choice overload can make you question the decisions you make before you even make them, it can set you up for unrealistically high expectations, and it can make you blame yourself for any and all failures. In the long run, this can lead to decision-making paralysis, anxiety, and perpetual stress. And, in a culture that tells us that there is no excuse for falling short of perfection when your options are limitless, too much choice can lead to clinical depression. In The Paradox of Choice, Barry Schwartz explains at what point choice—the hallmark of individual freedom and self-determination that we so cherish—becomes detrimental to our psychological and emotional well-being. In accessible, engaging, and anecdotal prose, Schwartz shows how the dramatic explosion in choice—from the mundane to the profound challenges of balancing career, family, and individual needs—has paradoxically become a problem instead of a solution. Schwartz also shows how our obsession with choice encourages us to seek that which makes us feel worse. By synthesizing current research in the social sciences, Schwartz makes the counter intuitive case that eliminating choices can greatly reduce the stress, anxiety, and busyness of our lives. He offers eleven practical steps on how to limit choices to a manageable number, have the discipline to focus on those that are important and ignore the rest, and ultimately derive greater satisfaction from the choices you have to make.

The Trouble with Genius

The Trouble with Genius
Author: Bob Perelman
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 284
Release: 1994-11-02
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780520087552

"Most poets define poetry by creating it. Bob Perelman creates it by defining it, and is thus one step ahead of all the other poets under the sun, one step closer to colliding with Zeno's vanishing point, to merging coyote with road runner, to winning the hand."—John Ashbery "Profound, subtle, and wonderfully written—this is a book from which anyone interested in the twentieth century can learn."—Marjorie Perloff

The Paradox of Mass Politics

The Paradox of Mass Politics
Author: W. Russell Neuman
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 260
Release: 1986
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780674654600

A central current in the history of democratic politics is the tensions between the political culture of an informed citizenry and the potentially antidemocratic impulses of the larger mass of individuals who are only marginally involved in the political world. Given the public's low level of political interest and knowledge, it is paradoxical that the democratic system works at all. In The Paradox of Mass Politics W. Russell Neuman analyzes the major election surveys in the United States for the period 1948-1980 and develops for each a central index of political sophistication based on measures of political interest, knowledge, and style of political conceptualization. Taking a fresh look at the dramatic findings of public apathy and ignorance, he probes the process by which citizens acquire political knowledge and the impact of their knowledge on voting behavior. The book challenges the commonly held view that politically oriented college-educated individuals have a sophisticated grasp of the fundamental political issues of the day and do not rely heavily on vague political symbolism and party identification in their electoral calculus. In their expression of political opinions and in the stability and coherence of those opinions over time, the more knowledgeable half of the population, Neuman concludes, is almost indistinguishable from the other half. This is, in effect, a second paradox closely related to the first. In an attempt to resolve a major and persisting paradox of political theory, Neuman develops a model of three publics, which more accurately portrays the distribution of political knowledge and behavior in the mass population. He identifies a stratum of apoliticals, a large middle mass, and a politically sophisticated elite. The elite is so small (less than 5 percent) that the beliefs and behavior of its member are lost in the large random samples of national election surveys, but so active and articulate that its views are often equated with public opinion at large by the powers in Washington. The key to the paradox of mass politics is the activity of this tiny stratum of persons who follow political issues with care and expertise. This book is essential reading for concerned students of American politics, sociology, public opinion, and mass communication.

The Pea and the Sun

The Pea and the Sun
Author: Leonard M. Wapner
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 233
Release: 2005-04-29
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 1439864845

Take an apple and cut it into five pieces. Would you believe that these five pieces can be reassembled in such a fashion so as to create two apples equal in shape and size to the original? Would you believe that you could make something as large as the sun by breaking a pea into a finite number of pieces and putting it back together again? Neither did Leonard Wapner, author of The Pea and the Sun, when he was first introduced to the Banach-Tarski paradox, which asserts exactly such a notion. Written in an engaging style, The Pea and the Sun catalogues the people, events, and mathematics that contributed to the discovery of Banach and Tarski's magical paradox. Wapner makes one of the most interesting problems of advanced mathematics accessible to the non-mathematician.

The Fertile Void

The Fertile Void
Author: John Leary-Joyce
Publisher:
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2014
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780993077203

A practical, accessible, and yet genuinely authoritative handbook on the application of Gestalt to the world of executive coaching. In The Fertile Void John Leary-Joyce, a pioneer of Gestalt coaching, distils a lifetime's experience of Gestalt psychotherapy, coaching and coach training. Starting with a down-to-earth examination of the psychological theory that underpins the Gestalt approach to coaching, the book then uses numerous examples and exercises to take you through Gestalt coaching in action. John then helps you develop practitioner skills through Active Experimentation, Bodywork, and Team coaching. He concludes with guidance on how you can develop your Signature Presence - essential to effective coaching, then examines the role of Supervision in a Gestalt coaching context. An invaluable handbook for both experienced executive coaches seeking to extend their range of interventions and impact, and those new coaches developing a coaching skill set. "A highly practical book, it provides transparent step by step guidance and numerous useful experiments all of which make it a great learning experience for internal coaches because it directly addresses the complexity of their context." "A great and very readable book for any coach who wants to increase their ability to work with emergent change in their individual or team coaching relationships." "Highly accessible, fluidly and expertly written, this book is beautiful.... It gave me a highly informative and deeply interesting entry point to using Gestalt in my practice."