In Place of the Flawed Diamond

In Place of the Flawed Diamond offers a survey and comparative study of Merleau-Ponty's philosophy. In Peter Hadreas' view, Merleau-Ponty is influenced primarily by Husserl, Sartre and Heidegger. But the sources of Merleau-Ponty's thought cannot be circumscribed by an «intellectual narrative» which depicts his thought as an inheritance from celebrated intellectual forebears. Hadreas shows how Merleau-Ponty's thought differs from Husserl's, Sartre's and Heidegger's. The issues Hadreas discusses include Merleau-Ponty's revision of Gestalt psychology, his theory of the body-subject, and his posthumously published doctrines of the «flesh» and the chiasm. These last two issues, in particular, are contrasted with issues in Heidegger's later philosophy.