Art Music: Love, Listening and Soulfulness

Politics & Social Sciences

Del Nevo, Matthew

Philosophy

Routledge

The Metaphysics of Night: Recovering Soul, Renewing Humanism

The Metaphysics of Night acknowledges a post-secular philosophy, one that puts philosophy into serious dialogue with religion, rather than considering religion a thing of the past. Matthew Del Nevo deals with the cultural unconscious, inseparable from religious consciousness, and draws on psychoanalysis and literature as well as philosophy. The metaphysics of the night is Del Nevo's metaphor for the deep and mysterious expanse of the soul.Philosophically, the book is critical of Enlightenment presumptions about knowledge and truth and overly spiritualizing tendencies in religion. Its critical edge cuts against materialist and historicist tendencies in the humanities and abstract intellectualism in philosophy. Arguing for strong aesthetic values, Del Nevo defends and explains soul and soulful experience, the creation of depth, the ineffable, real presence, beauty, and saving words, noting that the sources of all these are in us, but often are blocked. Each of the five parts of this book testify to what the author notes may be forgotten, but which ought not to be forgotten. It is necessary for life as socially, religiously, and educationally instituted within culture and as constitutive for culture.Del Nevo deals with sensibility as a form of wisdom and instinct that is not cognitive or knowledge/information based. He argues for a shift of emphasis in culture from intellect to intuition. This well-written work, filled with Catholic, philosophic, and artistic thought will be of interest to all philosophers, theologians, and students of culture.

Listening to music is not merely something one does, but something central to a way of living. Listening has the power to transport one into another way of being. It is a mode of feeling and forms the bedrock of deep emotion. Written from the viewpoint of a philosophy of sensibility, Matthew Del Nevo notes that this perspective may not be in fashion, but it follows a long tradition. Del Nevo emphasizes the aesthetic experience of listening to art music as it has developed and disintegrated in Western civilization. He recognizes a deep psychological element to what he calls "soul"—or more accurately "sensibility." He addresses music in a non-technical way, taking up the powerful art theory of Charles Baudelaire, the music philosophy of Schopenhauer and Richard Wagner, and takes a strong critical stand against modernist intellectual art music. The importance of this book for the musically- literate reader is its insight into the metaphysics of nostalgia. This comprehension is missing from nearly all musical instruction because we have lost sight of it. Del Nevo asserts that this understanding must be brought back into our culture. And since this is a book about listening to art music, it is no less about sensibility and its cultivation, which in its object form we call culture. An engaging book, Art Music will appeal to those interested in music, culture, and philosophy.

The Metaphysics of Night acknowledges a post-secular philosophy, one that puts philosophy into serious dialogue with religion, rather than considering religion a thing of the past. Matthew Del Nevo deals with the cultural unconscious, inseparable from religious consciousness, and draws on psychoanalysis and literature as well as philosophy. The metaphysics of the night is Del Nevo’s metaphor for the deep and mysterious expanse of the soul. Philosophically, the book is critical of Enlightenment presumptions about knowledge and truth and overly spiritualizing tendencies in religion. Its critical edge cuts against materialist and historicist tendencies in the humanities and abstract intellectualism in philosophy. Arguing for strong aesthetic values, Del Nevo defends and explains soul and soulful experience, the creation of depth, the ineffable, real presence, beauty, and saving words, noting that the sources of all these are in us, but often are blocked. Each of the five parts of this book testify to what the author notes may be forgotten, but which ought not to be forgotten. It is necessary for life as socially, religiously, and educationally instituted within culture and as constitutive for culture. Del Nevo deals with sensibility as a form of wisdom and instinct that is not cognitive or knowledge/information based. He argues for a shift of emphasis in culture from intellect to intuition. This well-written work, filled with Catholic, philosophic, and artistic thought will be of interest to all philosophers, theologians, and students of culture.

This is a self-help book with soul. Soul is not something we have, soul has to do with what we are, with inner quality, not outward expression or success or achievement. Soul is not about getting happiness, but about dwelling in melancholic enjoyment. The way of soul is a middle way between sensualism or materialism (consumerism) on one hand and effete spirituality and religiosity, or abstract modes of reflection including philosophizing and theologizing, on the other. We see soul alive in art and hear it in good music and we sing along with it in our favorite songs. Soul is not spirit or an idea, it is sensibility. Finding harmony has to do with developing sensibility, which we need to be able to distinguish from being religious, having ideas and beliefs, purpose-driven living, self-help techniques, and so on. Soul is deadened by techniques, tech-speak, and method, because soul is tied to creativity and inspiration and the power of now. With this book I hope to open my readers to soul and soulfulness as the primary business of life.

Finding Harmony

Self-Help

Motivational

Wipf and Stock

"Max Picard (1888-1965) was a Swiss-German writer, who converted to Catholicism from Judaism. A doctor and psychologist, Picard worked in Berlin but retired in the 1920s to Switzerland. He is often regarded as a "wisdom thinker," and his rich and penetrating writings continue to speak to us in the twenty-first century. The Flight from God is an incisive, profound description of many of the problems facing modern culture, and its analysis resonates with us more today than when first published in 1934. Picard illustrates that modern culture is essentially in Flight, and so the individual is under pressure to make a choice; in earlier generations only an individual could be in flight because the culture itself was not in flight but in Faith. The flight doesnot require courage or guilt; yet it is to be found in, and is often destructive of, many facets of life including human relationships, art, economics, science, entertainment, even religion. Because of this it leaves many in anguish, from which we seek alternative avenues of structure and meaning. Yet, in every person there is a residue that will not yield itself to the flight, and this is bound up with love, which reminds us of God. Picard shows how God is always somehow present in the flight--just whenwe think we are arriving from the flight, we find that God is already there. Picard's identification and discussion of the roots of the distresses of modern culture, and its attempts to grapple with the spiritual dimension of human experience, along withtensions created by freedom and individuality, are clearly still of the greatest relevance for us today"--

The Flight from God

Picard, Max

St. Augustines Press

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Del Nevo, Matthew. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Del Nevo, Matthew

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Del Nevo, Matthew. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Art Music: Love, Listening and Soulfulness

The Metaphysics of Night: Recovering Soul, Renewing Humanism

Art Music: Love, Listening and Soulfulness

The Metaphysics of Night: Recovering Soul, Renewing Humanism

Finding Harmony

The Flight from God