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Making Sense of Myth: Conversations with Luc Brisson

Making Sense of Myth: Conversations with Luc Brisson

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To most, myths are merely fantastic stories. But for Luc Brisson, one of the great living Plato scholars, myth is a key factor in what it means to be human - a condition of life for all. Essential and inescapable, myth offers a guide for living, forming the core of belonging and group identity. In 1999 Quebec classicist Louis-André Dorion published a series of French conversations with Brisson on the idea of myth. In Making Sense of Myth Gerard Naddaf offers an extended and updated English translation of these conversations, as well as a new set of discussions between himself and Brisson. Beginning with Brisson's childhood in the village of Saint-Esprit, Quebec, through his education as a gifted child in minor seminaries starting at age eleven, and continuing with his years in Paris, first as a graduate student and later at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), Brisson tells the story of his escape from an all-encompassing myth - the one promulgated by the Roman Catholic Church. The philosopher situates Quebec society as inseparable from the history of the Catholic Church in Quebec, and argues that this correlation offers a perfect paradigm of myth and mythmaking. Naddaf's introduction and afterword contextualize the conversations by discussing Brisson's and Plato's understanding of the origin and meaning of myth, elaborating on the role of myth in anthropogeny, in the creation of selfhood, and in multiculturalism. Making Sense of Myth promises both a philosophy of myth and a philosophy of life, one inspired by Brisson's lifelong engagement with the great Western philosopher Plato.

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BrandMcGill-Queen's University Press
Pub dateMar 12, 2024
ISBN-100228020719
ISBN-139780228020714
Paperback330.0 pages
LanguageEnglish
Dimensions9 × 1 × 6 in
Weight1 lb
Last updated 2026-04-14 20:26
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