Costica Bradatan

Costica Bradatan is a professor of humanities in the Honors College at Texas Tech University in the United States and an honorary research professor of philosophy at University of Queensland in Australia. He is the author and editor of more than a dozen books, including Dying for Ideas: The Dangerous Lives of the Philosophers (Bloomsbury, paperback, 2018) and In Praise of Failure: Four Lessons in Humility (Harvard University Press, 2023). His work has been translated into more than 20 languages, including Dutch, Italian, Turkish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Arabic, and Farsi. Bradatan also writes book reviews, essays, and op-ed pieces for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Times Literary Supplement, Aeon, The New Statesman, and other similar venues.

Articles

How to Swim Against the Stream: On Diogenes
Costica Bradatan considers the lessons of the famous Cynic Diogenes....
Costica BradatanJan 14
- Philosophy
- Politics and Economics
“An Idea in Our Minds”: What It Means to Be an American When You Weren’t Born One
Andrei Codrescu, Aurelian Craiutu, and Costica Bradatan discuss what it means to be an American when you were not born one....
Andrei Codrescu, Aurelian Craiutu, Costica BradatanSep 3, 2021
- Politics and Economics
The Plot and the Argument: Philosophy as a Narrative Affair
The compelling story of four German-language thinkers in the aftermath of World War I....
Costica BradatanNov 15, 2020
Always Narrating: The Making and Unmaking of Umberto Eco
Costica Bradatan looks back at, and behind, the life and thought of Umberto Eco, who waged a long war against “dietrologia” (“behindology”)....
Costica BradatanMar 9, 2020
The Gifts of Humility
Costica Bradatan contemplates the blind cruelty of power and the gifts of humility....
Costica BradatanDec 16, 2018
- Philosophy
Philosophy Needs a New Definition
Costica Bradatan says we need a Sufi master (or Plato) to enlarge our understanding of philosophy....
Costica BradatanDec 17, 2017
- Philosophy
Why We Fail and How
We fail precisely because we are so afraid of failure....
Costica BradatanSep 24, 2017
- Philosophy
The Philosopher of Failure: Emil Cioran’s Heights of Despair
Failure runs through it all, from Cioran’s “On the Heights of Despair” to “The Trouble with Being Born.”...
Costica BradatanNov 28, 2016
- Philosophy
Body of Work: The Dying Philosopher
The scene of the philosopher's death is a reminder that what is most precious — our life — is also the most fragile....
Costica BradatanSep 27, 2015
- History
The Idea of Europe
Costica Bradatan and Robert Zaretsky on George Stiener and "The Idea of Europe" as a place defined more by philosophy than economics....
Costica Bradatan, Robert ZaretskyAug 12, 2015
- Philosophy
In Defense of Margins
A garbage sorter in Mumbai's Annawadi slum can know capitalism inside out, even though he is placed at the margins of capitalism....
Costica BradatanMay 9, 2015
- Politics and Economics
The Two Abysses of the Soul
Costica Bradatan shows us how The Brothers Karamazov explains Russia's current politics....
Costica BradatanJul 31, 2014