Die Weltbedeutung des Spiels

Die Weltbedeutung des Spiels

Eugen Fink examines play as a fundamental mode of human existence. Through childhood, theatre, religion and art, he asks how imaginary worlds relate to reality. Greek athletics and Plato lead him to the body, technology and competition.

1. 0:01 — Human play and the seriousness of life
2. 4:34 — Mass entertainment and manufactured freedom
3. 9:31 — Why play resists definition
4. 12:35 — Is play fundamental to human existence?
5. 16:39 — Work, struggle, love and death
6. 21:40 — Playing for its own sake
7. 23:28 — Freedom from the demands of the future
8. 24:19 — The reality of an imaginary world
9. 27:49 — Children's play, competition and role play
10. 29:29 — The actor and the world of the stage
11. 32:36 — Spectators and the spell of tragedy
12. 36:43 — Beyond the opposition of real and unreal
13. 39:37 — Imagination and the world as a whole
14. 41:56 — Play, ritual, religion and art
15. 44:40 — The body as a philosophical problem
16. 46:39 — Greek gymnastics and modern sport
17. 49:49 — Plato, beauty and embodiment
18. 53:35 — Spirit, the senses and bodily existence
19. 55:41 — Technology and the expansion of human power
20. 56:35 — Competition as peaceful play
21. 58:43 — The body becoming the theme of play
22. 1:00:45 — The laurel-crowned Olympian

Eugen Fink — 1 recording in the archive.

Related reading: Play as Symbol of the World and Other Writings by Eugen Fink.

Dear Doctor, ladies and gentlemen, Human play, to which our reflection is devoted, takes many forms. It appears openly and in disguise, sometimes laughing its way into the gestures of life's seriousness, of pompous solemnity and affected dignity. Yet it remains a mischievous, cheerful, delightful activity, a way of living full of energy and exuberance. Far from care and anxiety about the future, apart from the hard hours of service and work, it is by no means only the domain of children and the paradise of youthful happiness. It also beautifies and enriches adult life, banishes boredom and melancholy, and conjures an illusory dream world in the midst of drab everyday existence. Play brings people together sociably and cheerfully in entertaining, short-lived communities. With a light hand it binds and releases. It fascinates, enchants and relaxes us, carrying us away for a while from burdens and dignities, freeing us from life's actual situation and bringing us possibilities of a fabulous kind. Everyone knows play from personal experience, from childhood, from hours of leisure and recreation. Everyone has joined in a game or watched others play. It is easy to name games and describe their types and forms. It is harder to grasp their colourful variety conceptually. In its vitality and power of transformation, play eludes the gaze that would fix it in place. It shuns hard outlines and escapes the net of reflective consideration. Its impulsive immediacy lies far from the sober cognitive spirit of the sciences and the speculative flights of philosophy. Play does not reason, yet it is by no means poor in thought or thoughtless. Its immediacy implies neither dull animality nor the unconsciousness of vegetative processes. It is illuminated by a peculiar understanding, extending from the impulse to imitate to the projection of new possibilities of experience. It knows both deep absorption and heightened awareness in symbolic representation. Human players, understood broadly to include the active participants and their spectators, move within an aura of meaning. They understand the game and its rules, and at the same time the activity of playing and its motivation. Play is a frequent and manifold phenomenon of the human world. It occurs among solitary dreamers, groups and masses alike. It is not only meaningful in itself; it is also evaluated and appraised in many ways. Such assessments run along a long scale and end in extreme oppositions. Sometimes play is…