Overview

Marcos Antonio Norris implements Giorgio Agamben's notion of 'secularized theism' to resolve a critical disagreement among Hemingway scholars who have portrayed the writer as either a Roman Catholic or a secular existentialist. He argues that Hemingway is, properly speaking, neither a secularist nor a theist, but a 'secularised theist', whose 'religion' is practiced through sovereign decision making, which, in its most extreme form, includes the act of killing. This book resolves an important debate in Hemingway studies and uncovers fundamental similarities between theism and atheism, building upon the theoretical undertaking first introduced by Agamben and the Existentialists (EUP, 2021). Bringing Ernest Hemingway, Jean-Paul Sartre and Giorgio Agamben into close conversation, the author reconceptualises existentialism, issues a posthumanist critique of moral authoritarianism and advances an original interpretation of Hemingway as a secularised theist.

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9781399516785

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Norris uses Agamben to offer a very welcome and original response to a long-standing critical impasse. Smart, insightful, and persuasive, this study ranges widely across Hemingway's work and has important implications for how we understand Hemingway's treatment of religion, the sovereign individual, gender, morality, and the human/animal divide. --Carl Eby, President of the Ernest Hemingway Foundation and Society

Author Information

Dr. Marcos Antonio Norris teaches for the School of Writing, Literature and Film at Oregon State University. He is the co-editor of Agamben and the Existentialists (Edinburgh University Press, 2021) and the author of numerous peer-reviewed articles, most recently including Francis Macomber, the Matador: Reading Hemingway's 'The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber' with Death in the Afternoon in Studies in the American Short Story and Reading 'On the Quai at Smyrna' and 'A Natural History of the Dead' in Consideration of Hemingway's Anti-Humanism in The Hemingway Review. His research examines the intersections among existentialism, the continental philosophy of religion, and 20th century literature, cinema, and television.

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