Primal Roots of American Philosophy

Bruce Wilshire is Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University. Recent books include The Moral Collapse of The University: Professionalism, Purity, and Alienation (1990) and Wild Hunger: The Primal Roots of Modern Addictions (1998).

“Bruce Wilshire is an original. His perceptiveness and his passion combine in his writings to create a magical world of present grief and future possibility. This new book is a unique amalgam of scholarly reflection, private soliloquy, emotional release, and spiritual self-cleansing—a prayer offered up to what Wilshire calls ‘the female archetype of a decentralized, pluralistic, and noncontrolling ground of being.’ Contrary to much dull philosophy, these essays are written for the human voice; for full impact, they need to be spoken as the eyes take them in. . . . This is a very good book, though by no means what is nowadays considered a standard work in philosophy. I consider that a strength and not a failing, for it sets an exhilarating paradigm for what philosophers can do. Wilshire appeals to experience, not only argument; to feeling, not only reason; to insight, not only discursive understanding. He requires that in reading his work we do what he recommends and place ourselves in contact with the healing energies of a deeper universe.”—John Lachs, Vanderbilt University