The Outsider is a 1956 book by English writer Colin Wilson
The Outsider is a 1956 book by English writer Colin Wilson
The OUTSIDER, first published in 1956 when Colin Wilson was only twenty-four, is a prophetic book as well as a literary tour de force.
The OUTSIDER, first published in 1956 when Colin Wilson was only twenty-four, is a prophetic book as well as a literary tour de force. By tracing, analyzing and giving a context to the disaffection and struggle of creative thinkers from William Blake to Ernest Hemingway, Wilson anticipated many developments of the 1960s and 1970s. The trajectory of Outsider consciousness led naturally to the rising interest in Eastern philosophy, the human potential movement, and the proliferation of techniques designed to help individuals transcend a sense of alienation from self and society.
FREE shipping on qualifying offers. The seminal work on alienation, creativity, and the modern mind-set. a real contribution to our understanding of our deepest predicament.
2. Religion and the Rebel. The second book in the Outsider cycle. Translated into Arabic and Japanese.
The first book in the Outsider cycle by Wilson, intended to outline his concept of the New Existentialism (the idea which underlies all of his work), and probably still his most famous work. Probably also the best starting place. It has been translated into Spanish, French, German, Italian, Finnish, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Dutch, Norwegian, Polish, Chinese and Swedish. 2. 3. The Age of Defeat (US: The Stature of Man).
I first heard about Colin Wilsons, The Outsider, when I read Sarah Bakewell's The Existentialist Cafe, which tells the story of the existentialist movement in continental Europe during the 1900s. Colin Wilson is only mentioned briefly, but her description of him as a person, and his book the Outsider, was enough to intrigue me to read it. According to Wilson the Outsider is a person that is plagued by despair and of alienation from the world around him.
The Outsider is a non-fiction book by Colin Wilson first published in 1956
The Outsider is a non-fiction book by Colin Wilson first published in 1956. Wilson wrote much of it in the Reading Room of the British Museum, and during this period was, for a time, living in a sleeping bag on Hampstead Heath.
And so we might speak of a ‘pain threshold’, a Year threshold’, a ‘misery threshold’, and find it quickly overpassed by the consciousness of some individuals, but lying too high in others to be often reached by their consciousness.
The relative handful of people who fulfilled Wilson's definition of the Outsider in the 1950s have now become a significant social force, making Wilson's vision more relevant today than ever. Through the works and lives of various artists-including Kafka, Camus, Eliot, Hemingway, Hesse, Lawrence, Van Gogh, Nijinsky, Shaw, Blake, Nietzsche, and Dostoyevski-Wilson explores the psyche of the Outsider, his effect on society, and society's effect on him.
work, and Colin Wilson’s landmark book encapsulated a character found time and time again: the outsider. A fascinating study blending philosophy, psychology, and literature, Wilson’s seminal work is a must-have for those who are fascinated by the character of the outsider.
Authors like Sartre, Kafka, Hemingway, and Dostoyevsky, as well as artists like Van Gogh and Nijinsky, delved for a deeper understanding of the human condition in their work, and Colin Wilson’s landmark book encapsulated a character found time and time again: the outsider. Luminously intelligent.