Scapegoat

René Girard

Athlone Press

Violence and Truth: On the Work of Rene Girard

Paul Dumouchel

UNKNO

An analysis of Greek drama and the basis of social violence.

Violence and the Sacred

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

The Scapegoat

Human beings, according to French thinker Rene Girard, are fundamentally imitative creatures. We copy each other's desires, and are in perpetual conflict with one another over the objects of our desire. In early human communities, this conflict created permanent threat of violence. The only way the violence would end was for it to be directed against a single victim, and it was around the victims of collective ciolence that Girard thinks that cultures first formed. Biblical religion, according to Girard, has attempted to overcome this historic plight. From the unjust murder of Abel by his brother Cain, to the crucifixion of Christ, the Bible reveals the innocence of the victim. It is on this revelation that modern society unquietly rests.

Philosophy

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC Audio)

First published in France in 1963, this is the first publication in English of the author's analysis of Dostoevsky's themes, revealing Girard's combination of mimetic-literary and religious approaches. No index. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Resurrection from the Underground: Feodor Dostoevsky

Literature & Fiction

Literary

Crossroad

In one volume, an anthology of seminal work of one of the twentieth century's most original thinkers.

The Girard Reader (Crossroad Herder Book)

Crossroad Herder

To Honor Rene Girard: On the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday (Stanford French & Italian Studies)

History & Criticism

Anma Libri

Rene Girard holds up the gospels as mirrors that reveal our broken humanity, and shows that they also reflect a new reality that can make us whole. Like Simone Weil, Girard looks at the Bible as a map of human behavior, and sees Jesus Christ as the turning point leading to new life.
The title echoes Jesus' words: "I saw Satan falling like lightning from heaven". Girard persuades us that even as our world grows increasingly violent the power of the Christ-event is so great that the evils of scapegoating and sacrifice are being defeated even now. A new community, God's nonviolent kingdom, is being realized -- even now.

I See Satan Fall Like Lightning

Anthropology

Orbis

In a fascinating analysis of critical themes in Feodor Dostoevsky’s work, René Girard explores the implications of the Russian author’s “underground,” a site of isolation, alienation, and resentment. Brilliantly translated, this book is a testament to Girard’s remarkable engagement with Dostoevsky’s work, through which he discusses numerous aspects of the human condition, including desire, which Girard argues is “triangular” or “mimetic”―copied from models or mediators whose objects of desire become our own. Girard’s interdisciplinary approach allows him to shed new light on religion, spirituality, and redemption in Dostoevsky’s writing, culminating in a revelatory discussion of the author’s spiritual understanding and personal integration. Resurrection is an essential and thought-provoking companion to Dostoevsky’s Notes from the Underground.

Resurrection from the Underground: Feodor Dostoevsky (Studies in Violence, Mimesis & Culture)

Michigan State University Press

This study extends beyond the scope of literature into the psychology of much of our contemporary scene, including fashion, advertising, and propaganda techniques. In considering such aspects, the author goes beyond the domain of pure aesthetics and offers an interpretation of some basic cultural problems of our time.

Mensonge romantique et vérité romanesque

History

Europe

Hachette Littérature

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Books by René Girard