ONTOLOGIJA POVLAČENJA U ROMANU KONTRAPUNKT OLDOSA HAKSLIJA

Abstract

The author of the paper applies the ontological discourse expounded by Martin Heidegger in his book Being and Time onto Aldous Huxley’s novel Point Counterpoint. The deliberate withdrawal of an individual from the impact of society, which Heidegger calls “they”, is marked as reticence; its aim is to re-establish the individual as a Dasein, aware of its separate self and ready to authentically exist in the world. As shown on the two characters from the novel, Maurice Spandrell and Phillip Quarles, in order for reticence to produce a genuine self, the Dasein needs to radically abandon any mode of existence within the “they” and claim metaphysical responsibility for its individuation. As Quarles even in his reticence still relies on intellectual standpoint of the questions of existence and self, he cannot experience the Heideggerian state of Being-in-the-world but just vaguely contemplate it. Spandrell’s example shows that the Dasein’s reticence is authentically fruitful only when Dasein abolishes his connections with the “they” regardless of the gravity of consequences.