Abstract

Souriau is known in France chiefly as a philosopher of art. However, most of his works—he published 11 books between 1925 and 1970—treat also of being, knowledge, and meaningful existence. The present study, interpretive rather than critical, immerses the reader in Souriau’s profound and poetic views on these themes. Souriau’s thought is often difficult. One finds in him links with phenomenology, process philosophy, Plato, Spinoza, Schelling, and Hegel. But he builds in his own way his high vision of man. As presented by Maubrey, Souriau starts with the immediately given, whose uninventable evidence, antedating the cogito, indicates to us an ontic reality beyond both the sensible and the intelligible. We can establish more spiritualized and meaningful examples of this ontic reality as we develop our own highest capacities. Souriau cites here the creation of a work of art and other examples as well. In developing his central vision, Souriau discusses forms of knowledge, cosmological realms, modes and degrees of existence, creation and the ontology of a work of art, the "shadow of God," and other topics. Maubrey describes Souriau’s "new optics" as an empiricism of the transcendental, a "via media between the irrational and ultra-rational tendencies of contemporary philosophical thought." This book is a comprehensive rendering of his rich and stimulating thought.—M.M.