Description
By (author) Younes, Farid
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Farid Younes makes his home in Byblos, a coastal town in northern Lebanon. He lived through both the Lebanese and now the Syrian civil wars. Like all Lebanese, he has plenty of “serious” in his life. The need for him and other Lebanese is to find the distance needed to cope and if possible to move events and circumstances in a better direction. His answer was to create a book that is a literary imitation of a coffee house with an open mic like the famous “Haven—The Cabin” that rests on a Byblos hilltop looking out over the Mediterranean.
The author”s neighbors meditate over their chess boards or gather in a back corner spinning epic tales of conspiracy as a way of passing time before the next spoken word performance . . . and as a way of making sense of the carnage of war and strife beyond Lebanese borders and the women and children-Syrian refugees-who line the streets in the major cities.
Nietzsche Awakens! is a game, yet it ultimately reaches past clever word play and the razor sharp slicing of meaning to depths that Nietzsche experienced in his own life, depths akin to those that Farid Younes has seen face-to-face among his fellow citizens.
At a certain point, the parlor game of this book becomes a controlled yet also a thrashing, desperate effort to survive-for one”s mind to survive against the ravages of age, and also for the culture as a whole to survive the inanity of rigid thinking, blatant self-dealing, and the other idiocies that prevent us from addressing the primary challenges of our time.
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Forthose who value mental fitness, Nietzsche Awakens! by Farid Younes is anessential read. In this slim volume, the author reworks all of Nietzsche”sfamous aphorisms . . . Why not? . . . and then invites Nietzsche himself torespond!
FaridYounes is a philosopher, architect, and college professor who makes his home inByblos, a coastal town in northern Lebanon. He lived through both the Lebaneseand now the Syrian civil wars. Like all Lebanese, he has plenty of”serious” in his life. The need for him and other Lebanese is to findthe distance needed to cope and if possible to move events and circumstances ina better direction.
Nietzsche Awakens! is a refined and disciplined versionof a coffee house like the famous “Haven–The Cabin” that rests on aByblos hilltop looking out over the Mediterranean.
Here, the author”s neighbors meditate over their chess boards orchat quietly and put the pieces of their world back together.Nietzsche Awakens! is a mind game, that could almost havebeen lifted from conversations in The Cabin. It is the author”s invitation toeach of us to test and tone our intellect, to use our intelligence to createclever word play and to define razor sharp slices of meaning.
At a certain point, the parlor game of this book reaches depths thatNietzsche (a famously troubled soul) experienced in his own life–depths thatFarid Younes and his fellow citizens know all too well. Farid”s discourse is aprecise and rarefied melody that floats through his book . . . and yet his texthas a base line, far below, that is sensed rather than read, felt more thanheard: it is visceral, a physical pressure, a movement of darkness. It is thetangible mental byproduct of the unspeakable cruelty and carnage of war and thedespair of refugees who line the Lebanese streets.
Where are we . . . who are we . . . if our minds do not work? Mentalfitness can be a gift, but it is also an obligation of each one of us toourselves, our families, our communities
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As the Muslim and Christian knights of Crusader times battled for theiridea of truth in these steep mountains above the Mediterranean, today humanityi
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