The Clever Body

In Western civilization, we have come to regard the body as an instrument or a machine that responds to external challenges but does not have a life or creativity of its own. Thanks to some of its inherent capabilities, however, the living body can act in a highly intelligent and creative manner. All of us have noticed from time to time that our body can move naturally, without any conscious effort; it can adapt to new situational demands and propose unexpected solutions. While skiing or rock climbing or sailing, we may have abandoned ourselves to our bodily timing and responsiveness, our acute feeling for new solutions. In The Clever Body, Gabor Csepregi describes in detail the nature and scope of these innate abilities – sensibility, spontaneity, mimetic faculty, sense of rhythm, memory, and imagination – and reflects on their significance in human life. Most of the time, people can convince themselves that their bodies obey them, rather like an intimate version of the myriad mechanical and electronic devices at their command. The author upsets that apple cart by showing how bodies have their own abilities, and perhaps even their own agendas. He discusses disembodiment, autonomy, sensibility, spontaneity, imitation, rhythm, memory, and imagination. Gabor Csepregi is the President of the Dominican University College in Ottawa. He has published over fifty articles, reviews, and essays on education, music, and sport.