A young philosophy student who stalks her old professor through the faculty corridors; a radical left winger who writes letters to Mao; two adolescents who find in their respective physical and moral deformities good cause to join forces: this dark comedy is filled with complex, flawed characters who live in a tangled world of impossible, visionary, and ungraspable theories, theories for individuals adrift in a sea of supposed electronic and digital connectedness, but in reality ever more fragmented. The novel wryly addresses themes of fear and violence, war and sex, eroticism and philosophy as it declares war on the concept of seduction in an era of social networks and blogs. This book marks a tart and immensely enjoyable debut from one of the most promising—and controversial—voices in Latin American fiction.

Las teorías salvajes (Heroes Modernos, 4) (Spanish Edition)

Literature & Fiction

OLOIXARAC, POLA

Contemporary

Ediciones Alpha Decay

Suomenlinna (Heroes Modernos) (Spanish Edition)

Calvo, Javier

Elegant, powerful, and unique, this short story tells the tale of a young, nameless man who dreams he is in an old-fashioned movie theater in 1909. When he sits down to watch the film, he realizes that it documents his parents’ courtship. Overcome by a sudden sadness—he knows the story will end in a loveless marriage filled with mutual recrimination—the protagonist shouts at the screen, desperately trying to interfere in his progenitors’ romance, only to have the rest of the audience think him mad. All of Delmore Schwartz’s narrative ability was crystallized in this, the most famous of his short stories.

En los sueños empiezan las responsabilidades (Alpha Mini) (Spanish Edition)

Schwartz, Delmore

Religion & Spirituality

Stone Junction: Una epopeya alquímica (Heroes Modernos) (Spanish Edition)

Dodge, Jim

After the death of her father during an unending Leeds winter, Camelia, the young protagonist of this novel, feels as though she is moving through a distant and closed world—a world of absolute consumerism and stereotypical behaviors, where freedom is encapsulated in a garbage can, or in the madness of a mother who lost her husband and her mind on the same day. During the long winter, Camelia learns that only in the language and prose of a novel—not in clothes, purchases, and dreams—will she find hope. And when she meets Wen, a young Chinese man who begins to teach her his language, the first rays of light will begin to penetrate Camelia’s dark world. This debut novel from one of the most promising voices in Italian literature won the Campiello First Novel award and was a finalist for the Strega, Italy’s most prestigious literary prize. Winner Of:Rapallo-Carige Opera Prima Prize 2011Campiello Opera Prima Prize 2011 Premio Strega 2011, runner-upAfter the death of her father during an unending Leeds winter, Camelia, the young protagonist of this novel, feels as though she is moving through a distant and closed world—a world of absolute consumerism and stereotypical behaviors, where freedom is encapsulated in a garbage can, or in the madness of a mother who lost her husband and her mind on the same day. During the long winter, Camelia learns that only in the language and prose of a novel—not in clothes, purchases, and dreams—will she find hope. And when she meets Wen, a young Chinese man who begins to teach her his language, the first rays of light will begin to penetrate Camelia’s dark world. This debut novel from one of the most promising voices in Italian literature won the Campiello First Novel award and was a finalist for the Strega, Italy’s most prestigious literary prize.

Setenta acrílico treinta lana (Heroes Modernos) (Spanish Edition)

Di Grado, Viola

In this polemic against some of the most visible and influential political, sociological, and philosophical writings of recent years, thinkers such as Zygmunt Bauman, Anthony Giddens, Agnes Héller, Gianni Vattimo, and Eloy Fern are taken to task for arguments and stances that the author considers ineffective and out of touch. Among the topics discussed are the fallacies of the neoclassical economy, the fetishism of a radical “otherness,” and the rhetoric of difference. A weighty attack on those philosophies obsessed with the supposed suicide of reason, the death of metaphysics, and the triumph over Modernity is also included, as is a debate over the European crisis and social movements such as 15-M and the Arab Spring.

Contra la postmodernidad (Alpha Mini) (Spanish Edition)

Castro, Ernesto

Trilobites (Heroes Modernos) (Spanish Edition)

D'J Pancake, Breece

Genre Fiction

The six lectures gathered in this book by one of the most distinguished contemporary American philosophers discuss from an innovative perspective whether or not ethical judgments can be considered objective. In the first four lectures, given at the University of Perugia in Italy, Putnam considers that ethics are used to solve practical problems, not to establish universal principles, and he argues that ethics are characterized by an objectivity analogous to that of mathematics but that trying to explain the objectivity of mathematics and ethics in ontological terms is a big mistake. Ontology, understood as the part of philosophy that deals with existence, would be the result of a great misunderstanding that has perpetuated under different forms from the Greeks to Quine. In the last two lectures, given at the University of Amsterdam, Putnam puts his reconceptualization of ethics in a historical context and proposes a narrative of intellectual and moral progress based on the succession of three enlightenments: the Platonic, that of the 17th and 18th centuries, and John Dewey's Pragmatist. Faced with cultural relativism and an uncertainty that brings an "infinite regression of interpretations" of current postmodern thought, Putnam defends the possibility of justifying in a contextualized way the resolution of problems and conflicts of ethical and political character.

Ética sin ontología (Alpha, Bet & Gimmel) (Spanish Edition)

Politics & Social Sciences

Hilary Putnam

Philosophy

Mark Z. Danielewski’s masterpiece, La casa de hojas, consists of two parallel stories. One is of Johnny Truant and his frenetic existence in Los Angeles at the beginning of the 1990s. The second begins when Truant finds a manuscript in the house of an old man who has just died. This manuscript tells the story of a married couple who move to a house in the country. This upper-middle-class North American family soon makes a terrifying discovery: their new house is bigger on the inside than on the outside. This finding unleashes a series of events in which family unity and harmony are brought under the spell of this nightmare architecture.

La casa de hojas (Spanish Edition)

DANIELEWSKI, Mark Z.

Literary

In this stirring introduction to Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations, noted French philosopher Pierre Hadot offers proof of the way in which the Roman emperor’s thoughts form part of a tradition of spiritual exercise that spans the period between the ancient Greek philosophers to Michel Foucault. This treatise analyzes Meditations as the work of a man of action who sought serenity primarily because it was an essential precondition for efficiency. Hadot examines the possible applications of Aurelius’s views on governance—an approach in which the city was a symbol of the ruler’s own soul, and thus intimately tied to his spiritual praxis—to modern society, posing questions and offering proposals to readers who, at a time of tremendous economic uncertainty, might look to philosophy for a more fulfilling way of life. Ultimately, the book argues that true philosophy isn’t merely the practice of addressing abstract problems and issues, but a concrete way of bettering our way of life.

La ciudadela interior (Spanish Edition)

Hadot, Pierre

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