Title: Star Wars And Philosophy: More Powerful Than You Can Imagine
Editors: Kevin S. Decker and Jason T. Eberl
ISBN: 0-8126-9583-6
Publisher: Open Court
Copyright: 2005
Reviewed by lazypadawan.
Open Court's Popular Culture and Philosophy Series has produced titles like Harry Potter and Philosophy: If Aristotle Ran Hogwarts, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Philosophy: Fear and Trembling In Sunnyvale, and The Simpsons and Philosophy: The D'oh of Homer. The publishers have also explored The Matrix (in two volumes, no less), Lord of the Rings, Seinfeld, and The Sopranos. Next they plan on tackling superheroes and hip hop, among other phenomena.
With the sixth and final Star Wars film upon us, Open Court gives the saga the philosophical treatment. The book is a collection of essays written by philosophers, professors, and others examining the questions raised by the films, such as could droids be considered "people"? Why do Jedi lie while Sith tell the truth? Is Yoda a classical Stoic? Was Anakin always meant to fall to the dark side? Other essays use the films to illustrate and discuss various philosophical perspectives. Everything from Taoism to politics to cloning to religion is discussed and the philosophers cited include Hegel, Aristotle, Saint Augustine, and Hume, among others. The book is split into four parts: "May the Force Be With You: The Philosophical Messages of 'Star Wars,'" "Try Not -- Do Or Do Not: Ethics In A Galaxy Far, Far Away," "Don't Call Me A Mindless Philosopher!: The Alien Technologies and Metaphysics of The Force," and "There's Always A Bigger Fish: Truth, Faith, and A Galactic Society."
The best thing about the book is that all of the essays are thought-provoking and intelligently-written, even if not every topic will be of interest to every person and even if you find yourself disagreeing with the philosophical slant or with their perception of the films. Many of the authors are clearly fans of the series and are sufficiently knowledgeable about the story. My favorite essays were "The Force Is With Us: Hegel's Philosophy of Spirit Strikes Back At The Empire," mostly for its sympathetic view of Anakin and its admiration for the saga as a whole, "By Any Means Necessary: Tyranny, Democracy, Republic, and Empire," "A Certain Point of View: Lying Jedi, Honest Sith, and the Viewers Who Love Them" for its interesting take on that issue, and "You Cannot Escape Your Destiny (Or Can You?): Freedom and Predetermination in the Skywalker Family."
Another nice aspect of the book is that the mix of essays cover the whole saga, not just one trilogy over the other. For the most part there isn't any editorializing about the films with the exception of one essay that accuses the saga, by solely examining The Empire Strikes Back, of humanizing technology while dehumanizing the human characters. This is strange since the films emphasize over and over that technology has the potential to dehumanize.
The oddest essay is one about environmental ethics. When the author is questioning the ethics of Luke taking out womprats, she's going to have quite a few people rolling their eyes and otherwise ignoring the points of the rest of her essay.
But even so, the essays beat fanboy message board rants any day of the week. The book will please those who have always viewed the saga as more than simple entertainment and perhaps make reading about philosophy a bit easier for those who would otherwise avoid the topic.
