101 experiments in the philosophy of everyday life - Roger-Pol Droit

Already a European bestseller, this text is a reassessment of our day-to-day engagement with life. In 101 short texts, Droit invites us to reconsider our most ordinary actions as unexpected philosophical events. Peeling an apple, trying to lie in a hammock, watching someone sleep, hearing your voice on a answering machine, playing with a small child - activities that, when considered outside of their routine, invite us to experience the familiar in startling ways. Droit encourages us to go further: pretend to be an animal of your choice, create a wall with your hands, try to walk around your room in total darkness, spend time in the subway system - and observe your oddity.;Each exercise takes a specific time, uses materials that lie to hand, and has a designated effect upon the spirit. Our simplest actions come to seem metaphysical, refashioning our sense of the commonplace as an altogether more surprising and provocative landscape.;This book encourages astonishment, unwedges us, topples the world a little, unscrews the coffin of habit. Influenced by Zen thought, it is a course in philosophical fitness, conducted in the gymnasium of what passes for ordinary life.