Darwin's worms
By: Adam Phillips.
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 2000
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 148
Subjects: Darwin, Charles, 1809-1882; Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939; Philosophical anthropology -- History -- 19th century; Philosophical anthropology -- History -- 20th century
Description: "Darwin and Freud took God out of the big picture, leaving nothing between humankind and nature. Their ideas were met with righteous indignation. But today, whether or not we read Darwin and Freud, we speak a version of their languages."

"Yet, as Adam Phillips argues, we are not merely trapped in a world of continuous loss. Taking as his examples Darwin's lifelong fascination in lowly earthworms, and Freud's lifelong antipathy to grubbing biographers, he unexpectedly finds much to celebrate. For both of these writers are interested, above all, in how destruction conserves life. They take their inspiration from fossils or from half-remembered dreams, and show how life is about what can be done with these humble remnants from the past. Darwin and Freud render aging, accident and death integral, not alien, to our sense of ourselves. They teach us the art of transience."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 137-139) and index.
Originally published: London : Faber and Faber, 1999.