Synopses & Reviews
The word freedom is in danger of becoming a distorted and tired cliche. In Another Freedom, Svetlana Boym explores the rich cross-cultural history of the idea of freedom, from its origins in ancient Greece through the present day, suggesting that our attempts to imagine freedom should occupy the space of not only what is but also what if. Beginning with notions of sacrifice and the emergence of a public sphere for politics and art, Boym expands her account to include the relationships between freedom and liberation, modernity and terror, political dissent and creative estrangement, and love and freedom of the other. For Boym, another freedom is an adventure that tests the limits of uncertainty and responsibility, of individual imagination and public culture. While depicting a world of differences, she affirms lasting solidarities with the commitment to passionate thinking that reflection on freedom requires.
Another Freedom is filled with stories that illuminate our own sense of what it means to be free, and it assembles a remarkable cast of characters: Aeschylus and Euripides, Pushkin and Tocqueville, Kafka and Osip Mandelshtam, Arendt and Heidegger, and a virtual encounter between Dostoevsky and Marx on the streets of Paris. What are the limits of freedom and how can freedom be imagined anew? Drawing upon her experience as a native of St. Petersburg, Russia transplanted to the United States, Boym dares to ask whether American freedom can be transported across national borders. With these questions in mind, Boym attempts to reinvent freedom as something infinitely improbable--yet nevertheless still possible.
By offering a fresh look at the strange history of this idea, Another Freedom delivers a nuanced portrait of freedom's unpredictable occurrences and unexplored plots, one whose repercussions will be felt well into the future.
Synopsis
The word "freedom" is so overly used--and frequently abused--that it is always in danger of becoming nothing but a cliche. In
Another Freedom, Svetlana Boym offers us a refreshing new portrait of the age-old concept. Exploring the rich cross-cultural history of the idea of freedom, from its origins in ancient Greece to the present day, she argues that our attempts to imagine freedom should occupy the space of not only "what is" but also "what if." Beginning with notions of sacrifice and the emergence of a public sphere for politics and art, Boym expands her account to include the relationships between freedom and liberation, modernity and terror, and political dissent and creative estrangement. While depicting a world of differences, she affirms lasting solidarities based on the commitment to the passionate thinking that reflections on freedom require. To do so, Boym assembles a remarkable cast of characters: Aeschylus and Euripides, Kafka and Mandelstam, Arendt and Heidegger, and a virtual encounter between Dostoevsky and Marx on the streets of Paris.
By offering a fresh look at the strange history of this idea, Another Freedom delivers a nuanced portrait of freedom, one whose repercussions will be felt well into the future.
Synopsis
The word and#8220;freedomand#8221; is so overly usedand#8212;and frequently abusedand#8212;that it is always in danger of becoming nothing but a clichand#233;. In
Another Freedom, Svetlana Boym offers us a refreshing new portrait of the age-old concept. Exploring the rich cross-cultural history of the idea of freedom, from its origins in ancient Greece to the present day, she argues that our attempts to imagine freedom should occupy the space of not only and#8220;what isand#8221; but also and#8220;what if.and#8221; Beginning with notions of sacrifice and the emergence of a public sphere for politics and art, Boym expands her account to include the relationships between freedom and liberation, modernity and terror, and political dissent and creative estrangement. While depicting a world of differences, she affirms lasting solidarities based on the commitment to the passionate thinking that reflections on freedom require. To do so, Boym assembles a remarkable cast of characters: Aeschylus and Euripides, Kafka and Mandelstam, Arendt and Heidegger, and a virtual encounter between Dostoevsky and Marx on the streets of Paris.
By offering a fresh look at the strange history of this idea, Another Freedom delivers a nuanced portrait of freedom, one whose repercussions will be felt well into the future.
About the Author
Svetlana Boym is the Curt Hugo Reisinger Professor of Slavic and Comparative Literature at Harvard University, as well as an associate of the Graduate School of Design and Architecture. A writer, theorist, and media artist, she is the author of The Future of Nostalgia, among other publications.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
and#160;
Introduction: Freedom as Cocreation
Adventure and the Borders of Freedom
Eccentric Modernities and Third-Way Thinking
The Public World and the Architecture of Freedom
Agnostic Space: Freedom versus Liberation
Scenography of Freedom: Political Optics and Phantasmagoria
Passionate Thinking, Judging, and Imagination
Shape of the Book
1 Freedom versus Liberation: Corrupted Sacrifice from Tragedy to Modernity
Hope or Fate?
Technand#234;: Plotting Freedom
Mania: Plotting Liberation and Tyranny
Catharsis: Freedom or Liberation?
Warburg or the Architecture of Deliverance
Kafka or the Ground of Truth
Mandelshtam or the Theater of Terror
2 Political and Artistic Freedom in a Cross-Cultural Dialogue
Plurality or Pluralism? Svoboda / Volia / Freedom
and#8220;Another Freedomand#8221; and the Art of Censorship
Freedom in Russia versus Democracy in America? Pushkin and Tocqueville
Two Concepts of Liberty beyond the Cold War: Berlin and Akhmatova
3 Liberation with a Birch Rod and the Banality of Terrorism
Modern / Antimodern: Dostoevskyand#8217;s Dialogues
Freer Freedom in Prison
The One I Love Is the One I Flog: Violence and Enlightenment
Urban Phantasmagoria: Dostoevsky, Marx, Baudelaire
Underground Man and Venus in Furs: Resentment, Play, and Moral Masochism
The Banality of Terrorism between Left and Right
Religion of the People and Liberation from Freedoms
4 Love and Freedom of the Other
and#160;
Totalitarianism for Two, or Adventure in World Making?
and#8216;and#8216;The Seducerand#8217;s Diaryand#8217;and#8217;: An Embrace as an Appeal to Arms
Kierkegaardand#8217;s Interior Design: Shadowgraphy and Architecture
Love / Freedom: Either / Or?
Aestheticized Sacrifice
Arendt and Heidegger: The Banality of Love or Passionate Thinking?
The Life of a Jewess from Love to Worldliness
Heidegger the Fox or the Traps of Homecoming
Loving and Judging
and#8220;Judgment Is a Difficult Issueand#8221;
5 Dissent, Estrangement, and the Ruins of Utopia
Dissent in the Plural
Monuments to Revolutionary Estrangement: Shklovsky and Tatlin
Rootless Cosmopolitanism and Civic Consciousness
Estrangement for the World: Arendt and Kafka
Writers on Trial: Dissent, Legal Obedience, and National Mythology
Artists on Trial: Politics and Religion in the Post-Soviet Frame
6 Judgment and Imagination in the Age of Terror
The Tale of Two Arrests: Arendt and Ginzburg
The Banality of Evil and the Art of Judgment
The Ethics of Intonation and Human Error in Kolyma Tales
Rationing Clichand#233;s, Documenting Terror
Mimicry, Misprint, and Technologies of the Gulag
Diamonds in the Sky and the Gulag Effect
Conclusion: Freedom and Its Discontents
Freedom by Numbers?
Is Freedom Lost in Translation? Cultural Critique of Freedom
Notes
Index