Lev Shestov: Philosopher of the Sleepless Night

The Jewish philosopher Lev Shestov (1866-1938) is perhaps
the great forgotten thinker of the twentieth century, but one whose revival
seems timely and urgent in the twenty-first century. An important influence
on Georges Bataille, Albert Camus, Gilles Deleuze and many others, Shestov
developed a fascinating anti-Enlightenment philosophy that critiqued the
limits of reason and triumphantly affirmed an ethics of hope in the face of
hopelessness.

In a wide-ranging reappraisal of his life
and thought, which explores his ideas in relation to the history of
literature and painting as well as philosophy, Matthew Beaumont restores
Shestov to prominence as a thinker for turbulent times. In reconstructing
Shestov’s thought and asserting its continued relevance, the book’s central
theme is wakefulness. It argues that for Shestov, escape from the limits of
rationalist Enlightenment thought comes from maintaining an insomniac
vigilance in the face of the spiritual night to which his century appeared
condemned. Shestov’s engagement with the image of Christ remaining awake in
the Garden of Gethsemane then, is at the core of his inspiring understanding
of our ethical responsibilities after the horrors of the twentieth century.