Paul Ricoeur 1913 – 2005
Paul Ricoeur was a French philosopher and one of the great synthesizers of twentieth-century continental thought. Drawing on phenomenology, hermeneutics, structuralism, and analytic philosophy of mind, he produced a long sequence of major works on the symbolism of evil, Freud, narrative and time, the self, memory, and justice. His three-volume Time and Narrative argues that human time is brought to language only through narrative configuration, and his Oneself as Another develops a hermeneutics of selfhood. He taught at Strasbourg, Nanterre, and the University of Chicago, and exercised wide influence on theology and the human sciences.
Key facts
- Nationality
- French
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Phenomenology, Continental
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Paul Ricoeur:
“The shortest path from self to self is through the other.”
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Attributed to Paul Ricoeur:
“To narrate is already to explain.”
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Attributed to Paul Ricoeur:
“Memory is the future of the past.”
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Attributed to Paul Ricoeur:
“Hermeneutics is the philosophy of interpretation.”
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Attributed to Paul Ricoeur:
“The symbol gives rise to thought.”