The Conspiracy Against the Human Race, by Thomas Ligotti

🖤👍

The problem with being human is that, in order to get through life, we have to try really hard to remain ignorant of what we are: uncanny things, self-aware puppets, evolutionary accidents embodying the contorted logic of a paradox. That is, according to Thomas Ligotti — celebrated writer of existential horror.

A departure from his normal fare of dread-inducing short stories, this is a peak into his mind, and into the philosophers and writers that have influenced him. Philosophically, Ligotti is a pessimist, and this work traces that history in ways that make this a unique contribution to that history of philosophy — nicely complementing other works I’ve recently reviewed, like “Pessimism” by Dienstag, “Dark Matters” by Van Der Lugt, and “Anti-Natalism” by Coates/Mishri.

Ligotti has a way with words, and this work blends philosophy, history of philosophy, and literary prose into a single whole. Very much worth reading. The picture below gives a taste of how some of it comes through in the book:

(Also — for fans of HBO’s True Detective: a fair number of Matthew McConaughey’s lines in the first season were heavily… errr… inspired by lines in this book.)