Broken world, fragmented being : Marcel and the embodied aesthetic

Abstract

Brokenness saturates the finite realm that is human-being. The lion's share of twentieth century thinkers have responded to brokenness by tending towards violence and nihilism. In contrast, French Christian existentialist and playwright, Gabriel Marcel, does not. Marcel offers that brokenness is the threshold of human experience, not its totality. Marcel offers brokenness as the loving threshold of human experience, not its meaningless conclusion. My thesis attempts to locate Marcel in the dialogue of twentieth century philosophy and aims to point to his thought as a viable alternative to brutality and ego.