Early March this year, author, professor, and philosopher Lars Svendsen will visit Shanghai, Nanjing, and Beijing to introduce the first Chinese translations of his works on the mainland. The tour will include lectures, book signings, and participation in local literary festivals.
Lars Svendsen was born in 1970 and finished his doctoral thesis at the University of Oslo in 1998. He published his first book, “The Philosophy of Boredom”, a year later. The young philosopher then proceeded to pen a substantial number of books whose universal themes and strong popular appeal resulted in them being translated into 22 different languages.
Popular Author.
Last year, Peking University Press jumped the trend with a trilogy of some of Svendsen’s most popular books introducing his philosophies of respectively boredom, fear, and fashion. Svendsen is already a popular author on Taiwan, thanks to the 2009 commercial publication of ”The Philosophy of Boredom”. The publication was given the catchy title ”We’re really bored lately” echoing the lyrics of Taiwanese pop-icon Jonathan Lee. Coming from one of the most prestigious academic publishing houses in the Chinese speaking world, the mainland introduction of Svendsen’s works naturally holds a much stronger scholarly profile. Nonetheless, the books have been well received by the public. All three books enjoy high ratings both among literary bloggers and in online communities like Douban.
Basic Human Emotions
The earliest book in the series, ”The Philosophy of Boredom”, examines the origins and history of boredom, and why it is an important state of mind. Published in 2004, ”Fashion” maps out the numerous possible interpretations of the word and looks at the phenomenon in both an historical and a philosophical context. Finally, ”The Philosophy of Fear” investigates the nature of fear with a strong political edge commenting on contemporary surveillance culture.
Blog description of ”The Philosophy of Boredom” (Chinese only)
”Douban” page for ”The Philosophy of Fear” (Chinese only)
”Menggang”s review of ”Fashion” (Chinese only)