from Financial Times:
But May’s concerns go deeper than turkey and sitcoms. Imagine a play that never ends but that you are not allowed to leave – how could it have plot or meaning, how could the actors fail to repeat themselves endlessly? In the end, they would drive each other mad, like the characters from Sartre’s eternal waiting-room in his play Huis Clos (No Exit), who come to realise that “Hell is other people”.
An immortal life, May writes, “would, sooner or later, just be a string of events lacking all form”. He does not deny that death is dreadful, he just adds that eternal life most likely would be too.
Only May’s Death targets the general reader – and it is a fine example of what popular philosophy can be: wide-ranging and thought-provoking, in little more than 100 pages.
But May’s concerns go deeper than turkey and sitcoms. Imagine a play that never ends but that you are not allowed to leave – how could it have plot or meaning, how could the actors fail to repeat themselves endlessly? In the end, they would drive each other mad, like the characters from Sartre’s eternal waiting-room in his play Huis Clos (No Exit), who come to realise that “Hell is other people”.
An immortal life, May writes, “would, sooner or later, just be a string of events lacking all form”. He does not deny that death is dreadful, he just adds that eternal life most likely would be too.
Only May’s Death targets the general reader – and it is a fine example of what popular philosophy can be: wide-ranging and thought-provoking, in little more than 100 pages.
May is also the only one of these four authors to grasp the real paradox of mortality: that the fact of death imbues our life with passion and urgency, but it is that very passion for life that makes death tragic. Our eye on the reaper’s hourglass prompts us to strive for our highest achievements; but that very striving means that when he comes knocking, it is always too soon.
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