Subjektivní tělo a život. Esej o myšlení Michela Henryho – Jiskra Martin (2017)

The central theme of the book is the phenomenology of corporeality in the work of the French philosopher Michel Henry (1922–2002). The first chapter outlines Henry's phenomenological method and how his 'material phenomenology' compares to the 'classical phenomenology' represented by the phenomenology of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. In the second chapter – dedicated to Henry's conception of 'corporeality' – the author first introduces the unjustly forgotten French philosopher Maine de Biran, describes Henry's confrontation with the philosophy of corporeality in the works of Condillac, Husserl, and Merleau-Ponty, and then elaborates on Henry's phenomenology of the body, namely his remarkable description of the manifestation of two bodily systems composed of three modalities of the body (absolute, organic, objective or physical body). At the end of the chapter, he raises the question of a 'unitary theory of the body,' which is presented as Henry's original contribution to the discussion on the issue of the so-called bodily schema. Finally, he addresses Henry's exceedingly radical solution to the question of 'experience-of-the-other,' exploring the manifestation of the invisible basis of intersubjectivity or precisely such 'co-being,' which draws its justification and unbreakable power from the pathetically co-experienced Life, which in...