Description: Brings Kafka's fiction into conversation with philosophy and political theory.
Brief description: Dimitris Vardoulakis is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Western Sydney University, Australia. He has written and edited several books, including (with Andrew Benjamin) Sparks Will Fly: Benjamin and Heidegger, also published by SUNY Press.
Review Quotes:
"...very highly recommended." -- Midwest Book Review
"Vardoulakis's original new book contributes to the fields of Kafka studies, political theory, and contemporary European philosophy by forcefully realigning our understanding of the problem of freedom and the free will as it traverses Kafka's literary texts. Its greatest strength lies in its careful and rigorous exposition of the refractory concepts of freedom that circulate through Kafka's most canonical works." -- Gerhard Richter, author of Inheriting Walter Benjamin
"Freedom from the Free Will is at the forefront of a vibrant new development in Kafka studies that, without succumbing to old debates about Kafka's supposed 'religiosity, ' rigorously works out the philosophical undercurrents and theoretical consequences of his literary practices. The laughing, playful Kafka encountered in Vardoulakis's book creates concepts of freedom that cannot be found elsewhere." -- Peter Fenves, author of The Messianic Reduction: Walter Benjamin and the Shape of Time