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Review
To miss reading this book would be a deprivation (Los Angeles Times )
This [series] is a wonderful idea ... They are absurdist parables, by turns hilarious, unsettling and enigmatic. (Nicholas Lezard Guardian )
[The series] sheds remarkable light on the literature, culture and politics of the region...anyone coming fresh to the field will be captivated by the richness, variety, humour and pathos of a classic literature that, through a shared historical experience, transcends national and linguistic boundaries. (Cj Schüler Independent on Sunday )
I urge you to go and read them. (Adam Thirlwell New Statesman )
This new series of Central European Classics is important well beyond simply providing 'good reads'. (Stephen Vizinczey Daily Telegraph )
This [series] is a wonderful idea ... They are absurdist parables, by turns hilarious, unsettling and enigmatic. (Nicholas Lezard Guardian )
[The series] sheds remarkable light on the literature, culture and politics of the region...anyone coming fresh to the field will be captivated by the richness, variety, humour and pathos of a classic literature that, through a shared historical experience, transcends national and linguistic boundaries. (Cj Schüler Independent on Sunday )
I urge you to go and read them. (Adam Thirlwell New Statesman )
This new series of Central European Classics is important well beyond simply providing 'good reads'. (Stephen Vizinczey Daily Telegraph )
Product Description
A Short History of Decay (1949) is E. M. Cioran's nihilistic and witty collection of aphoristic essays concerning the nature of civilization in mid-twentieth-century Europe. Touching upon Man's need to worship, the feebleness of God, the downfall of the Ancient Greeks and the melancholy baseness of all existence, Cioran's pieces are pessimistic in the extreme, but also display a beautiful certainty that renders them delicate, vivid, and memorable. Illuminating and brutally honest, A Short History of Decay dissects Man's decadence in a remarkable series of moving and beautiful pieces.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
19 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Cioran became a famous young writer in Romania, but left Romania for France in 1937 and made Paris his home. This was the first book he published in French, under the title PRECIS DE DECOMPOSITION. It won the Prix de Rivarol for the best French book by a non-French author, and for decades it was the book that overshadowed everything else he published. If a reader wants to know Cioran, this book cannot be ignored. It introduces almost all of the themes he would make his own--suicide, insomnia, solitude, the importance of sickness, repugnance for professional philosophy--and is the longest book he ever published in French. Richard Howard, the notable translator of many great French authors, has devoted his talents to translating all of Cioran's French books, and has done his typically splendid job. The translation is complete, utterly reliable, and catches all the sneer and boil of Cioran's own style.
This is not a history. It is a series of very short essays, a few paragraphs each, on associated topics, most of which deal with his deep skepticism about God and man. Cioran spent years writing and rewriting the book and in later years complained that it was overwritten. I think the elder Cioran was correct in his assessment of the younger Cioran. Even so, it is a book worth careful reading because the young Cioran pushed himself so hard, both in his thinking and in his attention to style.
7 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
if you want to have a new vision of history and of mankind, this is the best book in order to open your eyes
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
11 reviews
31 of 32 people found the following review helpful
Growing up the hard way
22 April 2002
Format:Paperback
It's a cliche to say this, of course, but nothing else will do. Cioran is an author that you either like, or you don't. If you do like him, and he doesn't make it easy, you find that in no time he becomes your favorite author...
This is one of his earliest books, and one of his best. If you are really interested in post-modern philosophy, art theories, social theories, etc., but find most of what you read precious, posed, downright incomprehensible, or all three, read Cioran. Reading his work, whether you like him or not, agree with him or not, has about the same effect on your thinking as listening to Bach does on your music appreciation. To the extent that you "get" the master, you improve your ability to sort out the useful and original from the bizarre garbage which poses as useful and original. A must read for anyone who wants to think rather than philosophize.
20 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Cioran's Most Famous Book
7 July 2006
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Cioran became a famous young writer in Romania, but left Romania for France in 1937 and made Paris his home. This was the first book he published in French, under the title PRECIS DE DECOMPOSITION. It won the Prix de Rivarol for the best French book by a non-French author, and for decades it was the book that overshadowed everything else he published. If a reader wants to know Cioran, this book cannot be ignored. It introduces almost all of the themes he would make his own--suicide, insomnia, solitude, the importance of sickness, repugnance for professional philosophy--and it is the longest book he ever published in French. Richard Howard, the notable translator of many great French authors, has devoted his talents to translating all of Cioran's French books, and has done his typically splendid job. The translation is complete, utterly reliable, and catches all the sneer and boil of Cioran's own style.
Despite its title, this not a history. It is a series of very short essays, a few paragraphs each, on associated topics, most of which deal with his deep skepticism about God and man. Cioran spent years writing and rewriting the book and in later years complained that it was overwritten. I think the elder Cioran was correct in his assessment of the younger Cioran. It remains a book worth careful reading because the young Cioran pushed himself so hard, both in his thinking and in his attention to style.
Despite its title, this not a history. It is a series of very short essays, a few paragraphs each, on associated topics, most of which deal with his deep skepticism about God and man. Cioran spent years writing and rewriting the book and in later years complained that it was overwritten. I think the elder Cioran was correct in his assessment of the younger Cioran. It remains a book worth careful reading because the young Cioran pushed himself so hard, both in his thinking and in his attention to style.
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Dubious Rapture
11 Jun 2006
Format:Paperback
A constant bedside book for me. It dissects our decadence with surgical precision. Its prose is more relevant and brilliant than many surrealist texts to which it invites comparison. The radical questions Cioran sets before the reader makes the book quite disturbing as it often hits the reader who is brutally honest with himself very close to dead-on bullseye. It's one of the most illuminating books of the eschaton as revealed in the immediacy of our lives, as we stand precariously balanced looking direct into the abyss and its depths of nothingness. The reader must harden his heart to withstand the abyss looking back at him straight through the eyes, into the deepest recesses of his own non-being. But then, the reader is reminded by the book's lucidity and made steady through its intransigence as it perforates the existential night with light as dense and permanent as the stars seen from the vantage point of a world steeped in pitch black. Our world.
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