Katie Ebner-Landy is at the moment finishing a PhD in Mental Historical past at Queen Mary College of London, earlier than she joins Harvard’s Society of Fellows in July. Her thesis examines a convention of studying character-sketches as ethical and political philosophy in early fashionable Europe, and her postdoctoral venture plans to analyze and critique liberal approaches to the moral and political worth of literature.
What are you engaged on proper now?
In the mean time, I’m within the very remaining phases of writing my thesis: going through the conclusion subsequent week. Every part feels, slowly however certainly, that it’s coming collectively, particularly with the conclusion representing a possibility to mix my work in mental historical past with a set of theoretical questions, asking what the custom of studying literary character sketches as philosophy may need to supply us in the present day. After all, as when doing any large venture, half of my mind is dreaming of what’s subsequent, which within the instant time period includes bringing collectively a co-edited quantity in French on literature and philosophy, entitled Les morales des histoires [‘The Moral of the Story’].
What subject do you suppose is beneath explored in philosophy?
The sort of philosophy that excites me most is a philosophy of the on a regular basis – one thing that first drew me to the philosophy of mores in early fashionable Europe, a context wherein philosophers have been simply as interested by questions in regards to the nature of the great, as they have been in blushing, in social rivalries and in the issue of our passions. I usually discover it laborious to find this type of focus in modern or twentieth-century philosophy, a terrain that has come to be extra occupied by literature. There are in fact some putting exceptions: Georg Simmel’s unbelievable essays on fashion, flirting and desire instantly come to thoughts.
What’s your private philosophy?
That every thing will be philosophical! Or, extra exactly, that nothing is ever uninteresting; that every thing is worthy of investigation and will be made to return alive by the correct of dialog.
What time of day are you most inventive?
I believe that is maybe one of many questions I focus on most with fellow PhD college students, with every of us dogmatic about having not too long ago discovered the perfect resolution, earlier than altering our minds about it a month later… In the mean time, I work finest within the late afternoon/early night, when the sunshine is most excellent: this for me is the window of what an expensive buddy calls “the great writing”, and my sister calls “the golden hours”. In trusting this transient slice of time, I all the time have two issues in thoughts: a professor who advised me that the one piece of recommendation she wished she’d had throughout her PhD was to be taught once you work finest, and observe this intuition; and a beautiful interview I as soon as heard with the thinker Michel Serres, who was adamant on the necessity to exit within the night, as soon as your work on the library is completed.
What recommendation do you would like somebody had given you?
By no means flip your nostril up at remedy. Understanding your self, because the oldest Western philosophers knew so properly, is vital to understanding a lot else: in philosophy, in love, in friendship and in life.
This part of the APA Weblog is designed to get to know our fellow philosophers just a little higher. We’re together with profiles of APA members that highlight what captures their curiosity not solely contained in the workplace, but additionally outdoors of it. We’d love so that you can be part of it, so please contact us by way of the interview nomination form here to appoint your self or a buddy.
