Experience of Nothingness

by Michael Novak

Book Overview

In The Experience of Nothingness, Michael Novak has two objectives. First, he shows the paths by which the experience of nothingness is becoming common among all those who live in free societies.... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0061319384
• ISBN13: 9780061319389
• Release Date: January 1978
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Weight: 2.45 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Neglected

A very good little book that is rather tarnished by the fact that the author went on to become a right wing shill. Quite how someone who could confront the "void" with such clarity and seeming courage could end up falling for the most vapid conservative twaddle is quite beyond me. Perhaps he was exhausted by living life standing straight up and felt the need to just throw in the towel? As someone said of Huysmans after such a book one either falls at the foot of a cross or the takes a revolver in the mouth...Novak hit the foot of the cross and apparently left his intelligence behind...Still this is an essential read. And for once an American patrolling these waters and not say Camus or even Celine.

What does anything mean?

If you are interested in considering meaning, the lack of meaning, what makes something meaningful or not, self-identity, the nature of reality and other trivial topics like these, this is a wonderful book and a small one, that will none-the-less take much time to read because of its density. By "density" I don't mean Novak is hard to understand... exactly the opposite. Many of his insights are so filled with meaning and implication that I, for one, can go but a few pages at a time.... writing notes all the while. Highly recommended, if you are a "thinker".