{"product_id":"fyodor-dostoevsky-walker-percy-and-john-f-desmond-9780813231273","title":"Fyodor Dostoevsky, Walker Percy, and the Age of Suicide","description":"\u003ci\u003eFyodor Dostoevsky, Walker Percy, and the Age of Suicide\u003c\/i\u003e is a study of the phenomenon of suicide in modern and post-modern society as represented in the major fictional works of Fyodor Dostoevsky and Walker Percy. In his study, suicide is understood in both a literal and spiritual sense as referring to both the actual suicides in their works and to the broader social malaise of spiritual suicide, or despair. In the 19th century Dostoevsky called suicide \"the terrible question of our age\". For his part, Percy understood 20th century Western culture as \"suicidal\" in both its social, political and military behavior and in the deeper sense that its citizenry had suffered an ontological \"loss of self\" or \"deformation\" of being. Likewise, Thomas Merton called the 20th century an \"age of suicide\". \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eJohn Desmond examines the cultural ethos of suicide as it is developed in eleven major works of fiction--Dostoevsky's \u003ci\u003eNotes from Underground, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, Demons\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe Brothers Karamazov\u003c\/i\u003e; and Percy's \u003ci\u003eThe Moviegoer, The Last Gentleman, Love in the Ruins, Lancelot, The Second Coming\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eThe Thanatos Syndrome\u003c\/i\u003e. His study is analogical and progressive in that it demonstrates how Percy \"furthered\" Dostoevsky's prophetic insights and intuitions about suicide as they evolved in modern Western culture. It reveals how the spiritual, moral and ideological conditions that Dostoevsky analyzed in the latter 19th century came to prophetic--and dire--fulfillment in the 20th century, as Percy observed. The study develops its argument through a close analysis of themes, characters, actions and images that reveal both correspondence between and development from Dostoevsky to Percy. In the Epilogue, Desmond offers a Christian counter-vision to the suicidal ethos of the age.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e John F. Desmond\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0813231272\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780813231273\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Catholic University of America Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 01\/29\/2019\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 320\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.45lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.30h x 6.20w x 1.00d","brand":"John F. Desmond","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":48086908698879,"sku":"9780813231273","price":75.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_c3afaf56-17ed-4b72-a416-0e06f0864f49.jpg?v=1769097264","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/fyodor-dostoevsky-walker-percy-and-john-f-desmond-9780813231273","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}