Anway Mukhopadhyay is Assistant Professor in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, India.Debashree Dattaray is Associate Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature at Jadavpur University, India.Saptarshi Mallick is Assistant Professor in the Department of American Studies, University of Graz, Austria. He is on lien from Sukanta Mahavidyalaya, University of North Bengal, India.

• Notes on ContributorsAcknowledgments Introduction: “Who” Is a Philosopher? Philosophers in FictionAnway Mukhopadhyay (Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, India), Saptarshi Mallick (Sukanta Mahavidyalaya, University of North Bengal, India) and Debashree Dattaray (Jadavpur University, India)Part I. The Figure of the Philosopher: Theorization, Tropologization, Interrogation1. Philosophy from the Feet UpAndy Mousley (De Montfort University, UK)2. Tasos Leivaditis’ Blind Man with the Lamp as Anti-PhilosopherN. N. Trakakis (Australian Catholic University, Australia)3. Beyond Mind and Matter: Robert Pirsig’s Quest for Quality Gabriel Ricci (Elizabethtown College, USA)4. Philosophers for Themselves or for the Society?: Václav Havel’s Plays and Essays between a Solitary Philosopher and a Philosopher-StatesmanTomáš Halamka (Charles University, Czech Republic) and Jana Tokarská (Metropolitan University Prague, Czech Republic)5. Search for an Alternative Onto-topology: A Reading of J. M. Coetzee's Life and Times of Michael K Ashok K Mohapatra (St. Xavier's University, India)6. Navigating Marlow’s Enigmatic Philosophy of Nature in Heart of DarknessMichael T. Heneise (UiT - The Arctic University of Norway)7. Ghost in the Shell: Relational Actorness in Moments of CrisisAleš Karmazin (Metropolitan University Prague, Czech Republic)Part II. Devoured by Fiction: Philosopher Figures' Journey from History to Fiction8. Love, Death, and Philosophy: The Representation of Albert Camus in Salim Bachi’s Le Dernier été d’un jeune hommeLynda Chouiten (University of Boumerdes, Algeria)9. Border Crossings: Foucault, Philosophy and FictionIan McCormick (Independent Scholar, UK)10. The Axial Age through a Novelist’s Eyes: The Philosopher Characters in Gore Vidal’s CreationJeffery D. Long (Elizabethtown College, USA)11. Reading the Trope of Yatra/Journey in Sanmatrananda’s Nastik Panditer Bhita and Chhayacharachar: The Possibilities of ‘Being’ and ‘Knowing’Arpita Chattaraj Mukhopadhyay (University of Burdwan, India)Part III. 'Philosopher', Defined Anew: Gender, Indigeneity, 'Ordinariness' and Non-anthropocentrism12. The Snail and Its House: Anneliese as a Home Thinker in Lou Andreas-Salomé's Das HausShruti Jain (O.P. Jindal Global University, India)13. Widows, Prostitutes, and Freedom: Philosophy in Unusual PlacesLakshmi Arya Thathachar (RV University, India)14. “Stories are meant to heal”: Indigenous Epistemology and the Elders in Richard Wagamese's WorksDebashree Dattaray (Jadavpur University, India)15. Characters as Philosophers: Understanding Igbo Proverbs and Characterizations in Chinua Achebe's Things Fall ApartBartholomew Chizoba Akpah (William V.S Tubman University, Liberia)16. The Ordinary “Seers”: Emotions, Detachment and Darshana in Dharamvir Bharati’s StoriesVanashree (IILM University, India)17. Performing Philosophy: Rajesh Khanna’s Philosopher Heroes from Early 1970s Hindi CinemaPiyush Roy (RV University, India)18. "The White Fox" as a Vision of Altruistic Self-sacrificial Love: Okakura Tenshin's Opera ManuscriptEiko Ohira (Otsuma Women’s University, Japan)19. The Fellowship of Tranquillity: The Poet and His Child PhilosopherSaptarshi Mallick (Sukanta Mahavidyalaya/University of North Bengal, India)Index

The 21st century needs this timely cross-cultural reinvention of philosophers, dead and alive, in fiction and lived experience, for deep thought and everyday dialogue in the Anthropocene.