Gabriel marcel biography summary forms

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Gabriel Marcel

French philosopher Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973) described man's place in the world in terms of such fundamental human experiences as relationships, love, fidelity, hope, and faith. His brand of existentialism was said to be largely unknown in the English-speaking world, where it was mistakenly associated with that of Jean-Paul Sartre. Marcel's view of the human condition was that "beings" are beset by tension, contradiction and ambiguity. He was also interested in life's religious dimension and was considered the first French existentialist philosopher.

Gabriel Marcel was born in Paris on Dec. 7, 1889, the only child of a distinguished diplomat. His mother died when he was 4, and he was raised by an aunt whom his father married. Although he had little visual memory of his mother, Marcel described her continued "spiritual presence" during his youth as an important influence on his thoughts—giving rise to an awareness of the "hidden polarity between the seen and the unseen." At the age of 8 he began writing plays, and as an adult he would achieve a reputation as a playwright as well as a philosopher. Marcel's plays, which flesh out the basic issues of his philosophy, were performed in the early 1920s. Starting in his youth he also displayed a keen ability to

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The “Awakenings” of Gabriel Marcel

Who, then, was Gabriel Marcel, and why spend time on a philosopher who, unlike his contemporaries, never refused to recognize the “ontological” mystery?

It could have been that my conversion was like an answer from Heaven to a prayer that [my mother] made without knowing that some days later she would leave this earth. Shaken up by what [my aunt] had shared with me, I walked through Paris, given over to a kind of ecstasy. —Gabriel Marcel, Awakenings

A paradox resides at the heart of the philosophy of Gabriel Marcel. That paradox is this: “Elusiveness is an essential constituent of his thought, and any exposition which [seeks] to eliminate it would be self-defeating.” [And yet] any competent and coherent study of Marcel’s thought… requires a deep dive into this paradox. —Kenneth T. Gallagher, The Philosophy of Gabriel Marcel

I. By way of an introduction….

I mentioned to a Catholic colleague one time my interest in “Christian Existentialism” about which I was learning from reading Gabriel Marcel. My colleague frowned a bit and then knee-jerk argued that he had never heard of Marcel but bristled at the phrase “Christian Existentialism.” And with some good cause since much of what we know of “existentialism” is its characteri