Author: Carlisle, Clare
Literary essays
Published on 11 September 2025 by Fitzcarraldo Editions in the United Kingdom.
Paperback | 184 pages
197 x 129 x 19 | 242g
Transcendence for Beginners examines life writing and philosophy across certain European and Indian traditions, exploring questions of childhood and mortality, art and religion, beauty and loss. Informed by her experience as a biographer of Søren Kierkegaard and George Eliot as well as her own life, Clare Carlisle asks what one human existence can reveal, and how writing can transmit its truth. Intellectually stimulating and deeply moving, Transcendence for Beginners enacts a philosophy of the heart, told by a generous and compelling guide. This bold, enlivening work asserts Carlisle’s place as one of our most innovative thinkers.