Freedom's Frailty
Self-Realization in the Neo-Daoist Philosophy of Guo Xiang's Zhuangzhi
Christine Abigail L. Tan
- 192 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
Freedom's Frailty
Self-Realization in the Neo-Daoist Philosophy of Guo Xiang's Zhuangzhi
Christine Abigail L. Tan
About This Book
This book starts with the radical premise that the most coherent way to read the Zhuangzi is through Guo Xiang (d. 312 CE), the classic Daoist text's first and most important commentator, and that the best way to read Guo Xiang is politically. Offering an investigation of the notions of causality, self, freedom, and its political implications, the book provides a comprehensive account of freedom that is both ontological and political, using Guo's notion of self-realization (?? zide ). This is a conception of freedom that introduces a "dependence-based autonomy, " in which freedom is something we achieve and realize through our connection to others. The notion that a subject is born with freedomâand that one can return to it by isolating oneself from othersâwould be a strange idea not just to Guo but to most Chinese philosophers. Rather, freedom is complex and frail, and only the kind of freedom that is collectively attained through radical dependence can be worth having. In sum, the book makes a new contribution to Chinese philosophical scholarship as well as philosophical debates on freedom.