One of the projects I’m most excited about in the coming months is the new philosophy salon that we’re running at Wind&Bones in partnership with the Wansha Performing Arts Centre, which is just down the road from us over in Anping.
Back in 2016, I set up a public philosophy salon at the Bookworm bookstore during my brief stay in Chengdu. The salon was a complete delight, and since arriving in Taiwan, I’ve been itching to do something similar. So it was a very fortuitous meeting with the team at Wansha, who have a wonderful space — and an incredibly creative programme of events.
We’re going to be meeting monthly on a Saturday afternoon to discuss philosophy and everyday life. Each month, we’ll have a new theme, and we’ll explore some ideas around this theme, as well as looking at original philosophical texts. As a start, we’re going to be talking about the philosophy of music, discussing Plato and the Confucian philosopher Xunzi.
The salons will be conducted mainly in Chinese, which will be a challenge, but it’s the kind of fun challenge that I like. So before the first session on the 20th of January, I’ll be brushing up on my philosophical vocabulary in Mandarin.
Image: Ma Yuan: Scholar viewing a waterfall via Wikipedia. Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
