A Companion to Schopenhauer

Schopenhauer is often considered an outsider among philosophers, and yet his philosophy deeply influenced key thinkers and writers, including Nietzsche, Wittgenstein and Proust, and remains a significant source of inspiration in philosophical research. A Companion to Schopenhauer offers the first comprehensive guide to the philosopher, covering all the major aspects of his work. It showcases contemporary scholarship on Schopenhauer and allows readers to engage in debates concerning Schopenhauer's ideas on a wide range of topics.

The reference contains 25 newly commissioned chapters by prominent Schopenhauer scholars working in the field today. These cover Schopenhauer's life and thought, and the crucial areas of his work, including: nature, knowledge and perception; world, will and life; art, beauty and the sublime; compassion, resignation and sainthood; and in-depth discussion of the context and legacy of Schopenhauer's thought. Contributors also provide fresh treatments of his theory of the Platonic Ideas, his philosophy of resignation, his views on love and sexuality, his color theory, his relationship to Indian philosophy and to Freudian psychoanalysis, and his often neglected ideas on perception, mathematics, scientific knowledge and the will in nature.