Irrational Man

Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy is a 1958 book by the philosopher William Barrett, in which the author explains the philosophical background of existentialism and provides a discussion of several major existentialist thinkers, including Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, and Jean-Paul Sartre. Irrational Man helped to introduce existentialism to the English-speaking world and has been identified as one of the most useful books that discuss the subject, but Barrett has also been criticized for endorsing irrationality and for giving a distorted and misleading account of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Summary Barrett discusses existentialism and its background, including the philosophical tradition to which existentialism was a reaction. He outlines the views of philosophers from Plato to Hegel, tracing the development of ideas about being, ontology, and metaphysics. He also attempts to explain how the study of science, history, modern art, and religion, specifically Protestantism, highlighted the background growth of existentialism. He argues that the modern world is becoming increasingly secularized and that faith has become "attenuated". He maintains that during the modern period, a questionable new "image of man" has emerged. Surveying trends in art, Barrett writes that the Dada movement was "one of the valid eruptions of the irrational in this century." Four existentialist thinkers - Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre - receive extended discussion from Barrett, who explains their main ideas and philosophical terminology.