Raimond Gaita - A Common Humanity

Name: Raimond Gaita - A Common Humanity
Start: 2026-03-19T18:30:00+11:00
End: 2026-03-19T18:30:00+11:00
Location: Upstairs at Gleebooks

About

6pm for 6.30pm Thursday 19th March

Raimond Gaita and Anna Funder in conversation about the Routledge Classics edition of A Common Humanity: Thinking about Love & Truth & Justice.

Published first by Text Publishing in 1999, then by Routledge in 2000, A Common Humanity is now available as a Routledge Classic. It explores how the various ethically infected conceptions of humanity inform our understandings of good and evil; of racism; of shame as the expression of collective responsibility, distinct from guilt; of the relevance of ethically different aspects of the Holocaust to conceptions of genocide; of truth as a need of the soul, even in politics; of the role that the concepts of the undiscussable and the unthinkable play in the ethical identity of cultures and individuals, and in arguments over free speech; and of the fragility of the ideal and even the idea of a common humanity as they might be realised in a community of nations.

The Philosophy editor of the Classics series said that he was “astonished by A Common Humanity’s contemporary relevance”. Nonetheless, to respond to critics, to new conceptual/theoretical developments and to world-changing political and cultural events since Sept 11, 2001, Gaita has written a new preface and afterword, which together total around 18,000 words.

Routledge says of the classic series that “it contains the very best of Routledge’s publishing over the past century or so [and] makes available in attractive, affordable form some of the most important works of modern times."

"Raimond Gaita's insights are original and his prose is as eloquent as it is affecting." The Economist, Books of the Year, 2000

"The trenchant beauty of the discussion, the courage and independence of the mind at work, are a magnificent accomplishment." Philosophical Books

"This Philosophy for the educated public is philosophy at its most profound." Jean Curthoys, Australian Book Review

“A wonderful example of how philosophy can still speak without any condescension to the educated reader." Simon Critchley, Professor of Philosophy, New School for Social Research, New York

Raimond Gaita is Honorary Professorial Fellow at Melbourne Law School and Emeritus Professor of Moral Philosophy, King’s College London. He is a fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. The University of Antwerp awarded him the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa “for his exceptional contribution to contemporary moral philosophy and for his singular contribution the role of the intellectual in today’s academic world”. His books include Good and Evil: An Absolute Conception, Romulus, My Father (made into a feature film of the same name), The Philosopher’s Dog, After Romulus, Who’s Afraid of International Law (edited with Gerry Simpson) and most recently, edited by Scott Stevens, Justice and Hope: Essays, Lectures and Other Writings.

Anna Funder is the author of Stasiland, the novel All That I Am and Wifedom: Mrs Orwell’s Invisible Life. Anna’s books have won many prestigious awards including the UK’s Samuel Johnson (now Baillie Gifford) Prize, the Miles Franklin Prize and France’s Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger. [They are published in over 25 countries and in many languages.]

A former human rights lawyer, Anna’s literary work illuminates with great intimacy the courage and conscience of people trying to hold onto their humanity in the face of tyrannical power structures. In 2025 the Australian public voted all three of her major works as among the top 100 books of the 21st century.