This audio-visual lecture will consider the biggest of themes, death. More particularly, it will consider three ways of ‘being with death’ that are apparent in the life and work of the late David Bowie (religious transcendence, existential defiance, and acceptance). It draws, in particular, on the philosophy of Simon Critchley, Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger and Tibetan Buddhism to explore these themes in Bowie’s work. Starting from Critchley’s premise that we should face down death, neither succumbing to escapism (oblivion) nor to the temptations of an afterlife (redemption), it argues, following Nietzsche, that we must, in order to avoid nihilism, make meaning in the world, and following Heidegger, that we must do so with others.

Freedom is understood as only taking shape once the inevitability of death is faced, and ideally when we live our life in readiness for it with others. David Bowie’s work can be viewed as a meditation on death. Importantly, he helped shape a meaningful experience of death, including his own, through a lifelong and open dialogue with fans about questions of alienation, anxiety, fear and mortality.

This is an in-person event.

It will be followed by a Q&A and drinks reception.