Dada and Existentialism
The Authenticity of Ambiguity
Authors: Benjamin, Elizabeth
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- About this book
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Offering new critical approaches to Dada as quintessential part of the Avant-Garde, Dada and Existentialism: the Authenticity of Ambiguity reassesses the movement as a form of (proto-) Existentialist philosophy. Dada is often dismissed as an anti-art movement with a merely destructive theoretical impetus. French Existentialism is often condemned for its perceived quietist implications. However, closer analysis reveals a preoccupation with philosophy in the former and with art in the latter. Moreover, neither was nonsensical or meaningless; both reveal a rich individualist ethics aimed at the amelioration of the individual and society.
The first major comparative study of Dada and Existentialism, this text contributes new perspectives on Dada as movement, historical legacy, and field of study. Analysing Dada works through Existentialist literature across the themes of choice, alienation, responsibility, freedom and truth, the text posits that Dada and Existentialism both advocate the creation of a self that aims for authenticity through ambiguity.
- About the authors
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Elizabeth Benjamin is an independent researcher working within the field of the 20th-century European Avant-Garde. She has previously worked at the University of Birmingham, UK and the Université de Lorraine, France. Her work has been published in French Studies, Desearch, HARTS & Minds, Synergies Royaume-Uni et Irlande and Papers of Surrealism.
- Table of contents (7 chapters)
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Introduction: ‘I Rebel, Therefore We Are’
Pages 1-12
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Choice and Individuality in the Many Masks of Dada
Pages 13-48
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Alienation and Reality in Dada Film
Pages 49-85
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Responsibility and Justice in the Dada Literary Event
Pages 87-121
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Censorship and Freedom in Dada and Beyond
Pages 123-160
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Table of contents (7 chapters)
Bibliographic Information
- Bibliographic Information
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- Book Title
- Dada and Existentialism
- Book Subtitle
- The Authenticity of Ambiguity
- Authors
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- Elizabeth Benjamin
- Copyright
- 2016
- Publisher
- Palgrave Macmillan UK
- Copyright Holder
- The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s)
- eBook ISBN
- 978-1-137-56368-2
- DOI
- 10.1057/978-1-137-56368-2
- Hardcover ISBN
- 978-1-137-56367-5
- Edition Number
- 1
- Number of Pages
- X, 229
- Topics
