Seminar about the Nietzschean-Bergsonian imprint in the early works of A. H. Tammsaare and J. Semper, 19 October 2022

On 19 October 2022, Mirjam Hinrikus and Merlin Kirikal will hold a seminar Decadence as dynamism and mutability: the Nietzschean-Bergsonian imprint in the early works of A. H. Tammsaare and J. Semper.

Under discussion will be the short stories Fly (1917) by Tammsaare and Holy weed (1918) by Semper. The seminar will centre around the article by Hinrikus and Kirikal, the main assumption of which is that decadence as degradation, mutability, alienation and mimicking simultaneously refers to overcoming and rising, so that the Nietzschean-Bergsonian notion of “life” (as authenticity, creativity, sexuality and dynamism) intertwines with decadence.