Play As Symbol of the World

Eugen Fink (1905–1975) was a student and colleague of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. Spiel als Weltsymbol was published in 1960. This is the first English translation.Ian Alexander Moore and Christopher Turner are Ph.D. students in Continental Philosophy at DePaul University. They are translators of Peter Trawny's Freedom to Fail: Heidegger's Anarchy.

This is a complex and challenging text, perhaps an essential primary source in the history of phenomenology. It is certainly noteworthy for exemplifying a unique crossroads in the legacies of Husserl and Heidegger.(Phenomenological Reviews) Compared to Husserl and Heidegger, Fink is a much more readable writer, and the translators have done an excellent job of rendering his words into fluid English prose.(Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews) Ian Alexander Moore and Christopher Turner do more than simply translate the words that are in this book. They convey the spirit that lives in those words, in its distinctiveness among other writings with its unique, kindly scholarship-in-depth for which Eugen Fink was highly praised.- Ronald Bruzina (University of Kentucky)

• Translators' IntroductionOasis of Happiness: Thoughts toward an Ontology of Play (1957)Play as Symbol of the World (1960)Chapter One: Play as a Philosophical ProblemChapter Two: The Metaphysical Interpretation of PlayChapter Three: The Interpretation of Play in MythChapter Four: The Worldliness of Human PlayPlay and Celebration (1975)Additional TextsChild's Play (1959)Play and Philosophy (1966)The World-Significance of Play (1973)Play and Cult (1972-1973?)NotesThe Philosophical-Pedagogical Problem of Play (1954)Sport Seminar (1961)Play and Sport (1962)Notes on "Play and Philosophy" (1966)Notes on "The World-Significance of Play" (1973)Appendices1. The Layout of the Volume and Description of the Texts2. German Editors' Afterword3. Bibliography of Fink's Works Available in English4. Secondary Literature on Fink in EnglishNotesIndex