Abstract
Readers of the works of Simone Weil (1909–1943) and of her French compatriot René Girard (1923–2015) cannot help but notice common interests and themes: victimage, social degradation, violence, Christ, Christianity, ancient religion, myth, and mysticism. Beginning in Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World (1978), Girard frequently refers with admiration to Weil in his writings, but the subterranean influence of the French mystic, philosopher, and classicist upon Girard is earlier, more profound, and arguably more extensive than he himself could measure.
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Further Reading
Astell, Ann W. “Saintly Mimesis, Contagion, and Empathy in the Thought of René Girard, Edith Stein, and Simone Weil,” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 22 (2004): 116–131.
Meaney, Marie Cabaud. “Simone Weil and René Girard: Violence and the Sacred,” American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly 84.3 (2010): 565–587.
Mongraine, Kevin. “Theologians of Spiritual Transformation: A Proposal for Reading René Girard through the Lenses of Hans Urs von Balthasar and John Cassian,” Modern Theology 28.1 (2012): 81–111.
Palaver, Wolfgang. “‘Creative Renunciation’: The Spiritual Heart of René Girard’s Deceit, Desire and the Novel,” Religion and Literature 43.3 (2011): 143–150.
Weil, Simone. First and Last Notesbooks, translated by Richard Rees. London: Oxford University Press, 1970.
———. Gravity and Grace, translated by Arthur Wills. New York: G. P. Putnam’s, 1952.
———. Lectures on Philosophy, translated by Hugh Price. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978.
———. The Notebooks of Simone Weil, translated by Arthur Wills. 2 vols. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1956.
———. Waiting for God, translated by Emma Craufurd. New York: Harper & Row, 1973.
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Astell, A. (2017). Mysticism, Girard, and Simone Weil. In: Alison, J., Palaver, W. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Mimetic Theory and Religion. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-53825-3_33
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-53825-3_33
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