In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity

In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity
by Josef Pieper

In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity
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Book Summary Information

Author: Josef Pieper
Translator: Richard Winston
Translator: Clara Winston
Edition: Paperback
Audio: German (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 1999-04
ISBN: 1890318337
Number of pages: 104
Publisher: St. Augustine's Press

Book Reviews of In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity

Book Review: Wonderfully clear
Summary: 4 Stars

The principal thesis of Pieper's book is that festivity is first and foremost a celebration of being and the whole creation as gift. For Pieper festivity and worship are interconnected. As usual, Pieper's writing is crystal clear and a joy to read. On easter, he writes: "Easter itself, although it celebrates a historical event, could never be a real festival, let alone "the festival of the Church", if it were not more than and different from a mere memorial day. What is in truth involved is a mysterious contemporizing of this event, which evokes an incomparably more real present than memory can". This thought resonated with me following a week spent at Solemes Abbey, where each Mass was (and is) an extraodinary solemn and festive occasion. I experienced there a powerful sense of memory i.e. the Church's memory of the Lord's last supper and passion was a real lived and sacred memory which was being kind of breathed into my memory, so that it became my memory too.

Summary of In Tune With the World: A Theory of Festivity

In this stimulating and still-timely study, Josef Pieper takes up a theme of paramount importance to his thinking - that festivals belong by rights among the great topics of philosophical discussion.

As he develops his theory of festivity, the modern age comes under close and painful scrutiny. It is obvious that we no longer know what festivity is, namely, the celebration of existence under various symbols.

Pieper exposes the pseudo-festivals, in their harmless and their sinister forms: traditional feasts contaminated by commercialism; artificial holidays created in the interest of merchandisers; holidays by coercion, decreed by dictators the world over; festivals as military demonstrations; holidays empty of significance. And lastly we are given the apocalyptic vision of a nihilistic world which would seek its release not in festivities but in destruction.

Formulated with Pieper's customary clarity and elegance, enhanced by brilliantly chosen quotations, this is an illuminating contribution to the understanding of traditional and contemporary experience.

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