A Thief of Peirce:
The Letters of Kenneth Laine Ketner and Walker Percy
UNIVERSITY PRESS OF MISSISSIPPI
Edited By Patrick H. Samway, S.J.
A collection of engaging letters by which an author and a philosopher share insights
about Peirce's theory of signs.
Throughout his literary career Walker Percy read and studied the philosophical thought of Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914) in an attempt to re-present in language the world as Percy knew it.
Beginning in 1984 and ending in 1990 (the year of his death), Percy corresponded with Kenneth Laine Ketner about the semiotics of Peirce. Their lettershonest, instructive, and often filled with down-home humorrecord an epistolary friendship of two men both passionately interested in Peirce's theory of signs.
Though Percy studied Peirce sporadically for thirty years and had written essays on Peirce, he still felt a need to learn, especially as he intended to devote his latter years to writing a book on language.
On August 8, 1984 Percy began his correspondence with Ketner, the Peirce scholar at Texas Tech University: "But you can help me. Unfortunately for me: Where CSP is very good about giving examples in his classical discussion of the difference between indexical signs and symbols, dyadicity and triadicity, such examples are not forthcoming in his writings on diagrammatical thought and existential graphs." Ketner's replies to Percy's letters reveal both a deep understanding of the complexities of Peirce's philosophy and a genial willingness to comment on various aspects of that philosophy. Above all, Ketner wanted to provide Percy with sufficient information about Peirce's philosophy so that Percy could proceed constructively with his criticism of the medical-scientific community and his interpretation of its agenda.
This volume of letters provides a rich philosophical perspective for better understanding the fiction and nonfiction of Walker Percy.
Kenneth Laine Ketner is the Charles Sanders Peirce Professor of Philosophy at Texas Tech University. Walker Percy (1916-1990) was the noted author of six novels, including The Moviegoer, Lancelot, and Love in the Ruins, as well as three works of nonfiction. Patrick H. Samway, S.J., the literary editor of America magazine, is the coeditor of Faulkner and Idealism (University Press of Mississippi).
6 x 9 in., 350 pages (approx.), introduction, appendixes, index
ISBN 0-87805-810-9
Order your copy through the Project Bookstore.