PROVO, Utah (February 21, 2014)—Greek tragedies have a greater impact on us today than most of us would own. Simon Critchley, a renowned philosophy professor and author, told BYU students and faculty that tragedy provides a better understanding of what it means to be human.
Critchley, Hans Jonas Professor of Philosophy at the New School for Social Research, said that “human beings are somehow compelled to follow a path of suffering.” They ask, what will happen to me? What is the right course of action? And repeatedly they ask, what shall I do?”
However, suffering permits experiences of truth. “Tragedy makes us come face to face with what we don’t know about ourselves,” Critchley said. It is the way of applying an emergency break; it slows us down and confronts us with what we don’t know about ourselves.”
But tragedy is not just a consequence of Fate, according to Critchley. “Tragedy is not a misfortune, but rather, tragedy requires some form of complicity on our part.”
He shared the example of Oedipus. Oedipus knew his fate because the oracle foretold it. “He knew,” Critchley said, “and yet still he raises his hand in rage and acts.” Oedipus followed the course of Fate because he chose to do so. “Fate requires partial compliance to bring about its truth.”
Critchley explained that there’s an element of agency within Fate by using the modern example of Walter White from the TV series “Breaking Bad.”
“Walter White insisted again and again that he did everything for his family. He says ‘I did all of this for you,’ to which his wife replied, ‘But you enjoyed it.’ His wife gets him to admit that he became the meth king of New Mexico because he enjoyed it,” Critchley said. “Walter White is Oedipus.”
As tyrants – Oedipus, Walter White – they don’t hear what is being said to them.
“We are tyrants too,” Critchley said. “We look but we see nothing, we listen and hear nothing. We go on and do nothing, except maybe change our Facebook profile.”
With that comes the significance of tragedy. “Tragedy is a boomerang structure. We throw things out in the world, and it comes back and hits us in the face, and we say, ‘I didn’t throw that.’ That’s where we need to have tragedy wake us up,” Critchley said.
So, “why does tragedy exist?” Critchley asked. “Because we’re full of rage. Why? Because we’re full of grief.”
And why are we full of grief, he continued. “Because we’re full of war. The history of Greek tragedy is a history of war.
“We live in a world where the frame is war,” Critchley said. With two sides fighting, each side believes they’re in the right and the enemy is evil. “They’re trapped in a cycle of bloody revenge.”
He cited an example from England’s historic violent struggle between the Protestants and Catholics. “They violently killed with justifiable reasons,” Critchley explained. “It’s a fight between opposed parties prepared to act violently in justice’s name.”
Critchley continued, “Can the cycle of violence be suspended? This is going on right now. In Ukraine. In Syria. Justice is divided. We’d like to think it’s a simple conflict between right and wrong, but it’s not. Is there way to suspend the cycle of violence? That is tragedy’s question.
“What we see in tragedy is an experience of adverse reason. We use reason to hear what is happening on the other sides. And that is what is going on in the Humanities.”
That’s what the Humanities are about – bringing the lessons of the classics back to today.
Critchley added, “The miracle of the Humanities is that Sophocles still affects us. He still speaks to us. It relates to us. If we don’t operate a brake system, and we don’t listen to what slows down, then we operate without a memory, doomed to repeat short-term versions of the future.”
Sponsored by the Humanities Center, Critchley’s visit was a unique occasion for the College of Humanities as Critchley is “one of the major voices in continental philosophy and theory,” Matthew Wickman, Humanities Center director, said.
The Humanities Center Annual lecture with Simon Critchley will soon be posted on the BYU Humanities YouTube channel.
For more information about Simon Critchley, view his profile here.
—Stephanie Bahr Bentley BA’ English ’14