Claude Lévi-StraussLa pensée sauvage (wild thought)

Hans Theys’ selection for his storefront.

“Nothing is more difficult than to explain to people that all cultures have a random and hypothetical origin. Only what works is true. In this book, Lévi-Strauss complicates this matter by explaining that the random forms that were the basis of the cultures that survived history (and therefore functioned) were based on a true knowledge of animals and plants. If it is an owl, it is important to know what kind of owl it is, because this better explains its symbolic value and thus its beneficial, yet random effect. The title is a pun that confirms the central thesis of the book, referring to the flower.

I have often written about Lévi-Strauss, for example in my doctorate, a pdf of which you can find here.” Hans Theys