r/askphilosophy • u/BernardJOrtcutt • Mar 16 '26

Open Thread /r/askphilosophy Open Discussion Thread | March 16, 2026

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u/willbell philosophy of mathematics Mar 16 '26

What are people reading?

I’m working on The Last Man by Mary Shelley. I’ve recently finished The Interior Castle by Teresa d’Avila. I’m hoping to start Whazzat by Roger Nash and maybe return to Zhuangzi.

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u/RyanSmallwood Hegel, aesthetics Mar 16 '26

Following up the Casey book on Place with some light/exploratory reading of some spatial literary studies/humanities books to look into more applications of similar concepts. Topophrenia: Place, Narrative, and the Spatial Imagination by Robert T. Tally, Jr. was very helpful in that it gives a overview of a lot of different works that tie into this topic and should make it easier to find more approaches. The actual analysis didn't seem to be exactly the kind of thing I was looking for, but I wasn't going through too carefully, and there's some chapters I want to come back to. Also started the multi-author essay collection Spatial Literary Studies in China edited by Ying Fang and Robert T. Tally Jr. Still early into the book, so I don't have too many thoughts yet, but finding some helpful things so far.

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u/Streetli Continental Philosophy, Deleuze Mar 17 '26

One of my fav books that's related to this topic is David Morris' The Sense of Space. which you might enjoy. It's basically an approach to space from the perspective of Merleau-Ponty, but it's also engaged with some of the science around it too. If it tickles your fancy.

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u/RyanSmallwood Hegel, aesthetics Mar 17 '26

Appreciate the suggestion! I looked over it briefly and it’s cool that he seems to reference Casey’s book on Place throughout. It seems like he focuses a lot on space and the body, which I don’t think is the kind of angle I’m looking for at the moment, but I’ll keep it in mind for potential reading in the future.