Culture of the Excuse
Why do people tell each other things? Why did they learn to tell stories? What cultural achievements are linked to telling stories? And what is story telling in the first place? Fritz Breithaupt gives us an astounding answer to this question.
Telling stories allows us to present excuses. With an excuse, one can remove one’s head from the noose. The essence of an excuse consists of mostly new, mostly complex descriptions of actions that have already been evaluated. In the first excuse in the history of mankind, Adam admits that he ate the apple but denies responsibility because Eve persuaded him to do it. With this primal scene in mind, this volume follows the interwoven paths of legal responsibility and literature, and in the process, draws on evolutionary biological knowledge.Persons
Fritz Breithaupt
OTHER PUBLICATIONS
Once Is Never Enough
Do you remember your first kiss? Our first experiences may have been terribly embarrassing, maybe clouded in our memory, yet they mark a beginning. Everything afterward becomes repetition. To be sure, repetitions carry their own power—they may be more enjoyable because we can compare them to what came before. This book explores the nature of human experiences. While we often think of...
The Narrative Brain
English world rights (Yale UP), Spanish world rights (Sexto Piso), Italy (Lit/Castelvecchi), Korea (Eco-Livres), Hungary (Typotex), Bulgaria (Funtasy)
The Dark Sides of Empathy
Empathy is considered the basis of moral action. But if we examine this more carefully, the ability to »empathize with other people« proves itself to be a prerequisite for deliberate...
English world rights (Cornell UP), Korea (SOSO)
Previously published in the respective language / territory; rights available again: Hungary (Typotex)
Cultures of Empathy
Spanish world rights (Katz)