Robert Musil

Abstract The Austrian novelist, Robert Musil (1880–1942), author of The Man without Qualities, was not a professional philosopher. He was a novelist—and according to the widely accepted canon, his contribution to the twentieth-century novel is only matched by very few. But Musil was a philosopher—just a different kind of philosopher. He was trained in philosophy (he wrote his PhD on Ernst Mach) and gave up a promising career in academia, because he thought it was better to express his philosophical ideas by means of writing novels. He was a philosophical outsider. Bence Nanay argues in this book that Musil’s writings reveal an extremely original and powerful philosophical view that we should take very seriously. The book covers topics in pretty much all philosophical disciplines, from the philosophy of mind through aesthetics and ethics to even metaphysics and epistemology. The aim of this book is to give a systematic treatment of Musil’s philosophy and make a case for why it is not merely of historical interest, but it is incredibly (and sometimes painfully) relevant for all of us in the twenty-first century. The book has not been written for Musil insiders only. Even those who have never read a line of Musil can still engage with it, and hopefully you will be persuaded to give Musil a try. But this book is also for those who know Musil inside out. Further, the book does not presuppose any prior knowledge of any philosophy either, so those without any philosophy background can also follow along.