cover image The Perils of the One

The Perils of the One

Stathis Gourgouris. Columbia Univ., $35 trade paper (288p) ISBN 978-0-231-19288-0

Gourgouris (Lessons in Secular Criticism), professor of comparative literature at Columbia Univ., offers a dense, wide-ranging investigation into the political, philosophical, and religious impulse toward unitary, monistic thinking. He lays out his case in a series of essays, the first of which uses the writing and life of Edward Said to argue that what he terms “secular criticism” needs to wrestle with contradictions rather than set up a totalizing philosophies. In the second, Gourgouris draws on the work of French anthropologist Pierre Clastres and antimonarchist Etienne de la Boétie to show how centralizing political power is only possible by creating a group excluded from society whose very exclusion gives them great power. After an essay arguing that Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, who is known for his Marxist critiques of popular culture, should be considered a realist, Gourgouris pivots to religion with a persuasive linguistic analysis about how Paul used Greek to transform the idea of submission to a single God as a form of freedom. The final and longest essay traces the lingering political effects of historical monotheists’ violent suppression of alternative beliefs, including fights over the Trinity and the destruction of idols. Gourgouris’s complex writing requires a high level of specialized knowledge, but scholars in religion and philosophy will find this stimulating. (June)