Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity

Abstract

Preface Introduction Part I. Contingency: 1. The contingency of language 2. The contingency of selfhood 3. The contingency of a liberal community Part II. Ironism and Theory: 4. Private irony and liberal hope 5. Self-creation and affiliation: Proust, Nietzsche, and Heidegger 6. From ironist theory to private allusions: Derrida Part III. Cruelty and Solidarity: 7. The barber of Kasbeam: Nabokov on cruelty 8. The last intellectual in Europe: Orwell on cruelty 9. Solidarity Index of names.