Selflessness

Jonathan Rée

Proper Names by Emmanuel Levinas, translated by Michael Smith
Athlone, 191 pp, £45.00, January 1997, ISBN 0 485 11466 6
Levinas: An Introduction by Colin Davis
Polity, 168 pp, £39.50, November 1996, ISBN 0 7456 1262 8
Basic Philosophical Writings by Emmanuel Levinas, edited by Adriaan Peperzak, Simon Critchley and Robert Bernasconi
Indiana, 201 pp, £29.50, November 1996, ISBN 0 253 21079 8

‘For God’s sake leave me alone!’ ‘Why the hell should I?’ ‘What’s it to me anyway?’ That sort of unilateral declaration of indifference must be the starting point of nearly all family quarrels, and plenty of political catastrophes as well. ‘Why should I always give way to other people? Am I my brother’s keeper?’ But eventually the question will be turned sarcastically back on you. ‘You think you’re so special? The only pebble on the beach? It’ll be a different story when it’s you that’s run out of luck, just you wait and see.’

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Vol. 19 No. 9 · 8 May 1997 » Jonathan Rée » Selflessness (print version)
pages 16-19 | 5406 words