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What is a sane response to a mad world?
Can laughter be liberating? Is civilization a thin veneer over our natural lawlessness? Can violence ever be justified in response to an unjust social order? Is one bad day really all it takes to create a villain? Joker is one of the most fascinating villains in the DC Comics universe. A diabolically sinister but clownish villain, he is both crazed and cunning, sadistically cruel yet seductively charming. He is the character most deeply connected to the Dark Knight, his most iconic antagonist and moral antithesis, embodying everything opposed to the positive ideals of order and justice defended by the Batman. In
Joker and Philosophy, a squad of top-notch philosophical thinkers plumb the existential depths of the Clown Prince of Crime with an abundance of style, wit, and intelligence worthy of their roguish subject. Requiring no background in philosophy, this easily accessible book offers original insights into what makes this villain tick while probing the meaning of his murderous escapades. With his enigmatic motivations, infectious irreverence, and selfless devotion to evil, Joker is a brightly colored puzzle whose perpetual grin and maniacal laugh provoke a host of philosophical questions, ranging across issues of morality, human nature, the metaphysics of freedom, the nature of identity, good and evil, political and social philosophy, aesthetics, and more--all of which are brilliantly explored in
Joker and Philosophy. To learn more about the Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture series, visit
www.andphilosophy.com
Sommario
Notes on Contributors ix
Introduction: "There Were These Two Guys in a Lunatic Asylum ..." 1
Part I "Is It Just Me or Is It Getting Crazier Out There?"--Living with the Absurd 3 1 It's All Just a Sick Joke: Joker, Batman, and the Absurd 5
Erich Christiansen 2 "Do I Look Like a Man with a Plan?": The Joker as a Daoist Wild Card 14
Ryan Harte and Alba Curry 3 The Dionysian Clown: Analyzing the Fool through Nietzsche's Philosophy 22
Marco Favaro 4 The Clown Prince of Chaos: Philosophy and the Fear of Indetermination 32
Alberto Morán Roa Part II "I'm an Agent of Chaos"--The Good, the Bad, and the Crazy 39 5 Good and Evil: The Two Jokers in Plato's Deck of Cards 41
James Lawler 6 Radical Evil, Diabolical Evil, and The Dark Knight's Joker 49
George A. Dunn 7 "When the Chips Are Down, These Civilized People, They'll Eat Each Other": The Joker's Anti-Hobbesian State of Nature 59
Damien K. Picariello 8 You Get What You F****** Deserve 68
Greg Littmann Part III "When You Bring Me Out, Can You Introduce Me as Joker?"--Joker's Identity 77 9 From Momus to the Joker: Genealogy of an Anti-Hero 79
Massimiliano L. Cappuccio 10 Tell a Joke, Be a Hero: Joker and the Trickster Archetype 88
Andrea Zanin 11 The Contradictory Clown Prince of Crime 96
Roy T. Cook and Nathan Kellen 12 "If I Am Going to Have a Past, I Prefer It to Be Multiple Choice": The Joker, Madness, and Metafiction 106
Jan Forsman 13 Madness in Relation: The Autonomy of a Joke 117
Shaun Respess Part IV "Their Morals, Their Code-It's a Bad Joke"--Joker's Justice and Political Philosophy 127 14 More on Joker: From Apolitical Nihilism to a New Left--Or Why Trump Is No Joker 129
Slavoj Zizek 15 "If It Was Me Dying on the Sidewalk, You'd Walk Right over Me": Joker's Guide to Responding to Injustice 139
Luke Howie 16 Battleground Gotham: Joker's War on Capitalism 148
Clint Jones Part V "Why So Serious?"--Laughter, Humor, and Satire 157 17 In Praise of Joker 159
Walter Barta and Emily Vega 18 Joker--The Epitome of Humor in Three Silly Acts 169
Jarno Hietalahti 19 Ha-Ha-Ha! I'm Going to Die!: Laughing at Death with Joker, Jerry, and Deleuze 176
Corry Shores 20 "Perhaps Even Laughter Still Has a Future": Joker's Carnivalesque Politics 186
Utku Cansu Part VI "You and I Are Destined to Do This Forever"--Significant Others, Reason, and Sanity 197 21 "Puddin'" Her Place: Harley Quinn as Joker's Enslaved Lover 199
Elizabeth Kusko and Caleb McGee Husmann 22 The Stoic Punchline of "One Bad Day" 207
Matt Hummel 23 The Joke's on You: Brains, Responsibility, and the Myth of Mental Illness Revisited 215
Thomas D. Harter 24 Joker and the Need for Fathers and Family 225
Kody W. Cooper
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MASSIMILIANO L. CAPPUCCIO is a Senior Researcher in the School of Engineering & Technology of the University of New South Wales Canberra, Australia. He has contributed to several
Pop Culture and Philosophy titles and edited a collection of essays on
The Matrix. GEORGE A. DUNN is a research fellow at the Institute for the Marxist Study of Religion in a New Era at Hangzhou City University, China, and a community associate at Indiana University Indianapolis. He is an editor of
The Hunger Games and Philosophy and
True Blood and Philosophy and has written chapters in books in the
Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture series on
Terminator, Iron Man,
Battlestar Galactica, and
Mad Men.
JASON T. EBERL is Professor of Health Care Ethics and Philosophy and Director of the Albert Gnaegi Center for Health Care Ethics, Saint Louis University, USA. He is the editor of
Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy and co-editor of
The Ultimate Star Wars and Philosophy,
The Ultimate Star Trek and Philosophy,
Sons of Anarchy and Philosophy, and
The Philosophy of Christopher Nolan.
