Faking It

This book is about the intrusive fear that we may not be what we appear to be, or worse, that we may be only what we appear to be and nothing more. It is concerned with the worry of being exposed as frauds in our profession, cads in our love lives, as less than virtuously motivated actors when we are being agreeable, charitable, or decent. Why do we so often mistrust the motives of our own deeds, thinking them fake, though the beneficiary of them gives us full credit? Much of this book deals with that self-tormenting self-consciousness. It is about roles and identity, discussing our engagement in the roles we play, our doubts about our identities amidst this flux of roles, and thus about anxieties of authenticity.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction: split in two; 2. Hypocrisy and Jesus; 3. Anti-hypocrisy: looking bad in order to be good; 4. Virtues with natural immunities to hypocrisy; 5. Naked truth: hey, wanna …?; 6. In divine services and other ritualized performances; 7. Say it like you mean it: mandatory faking and apology; 8. Flattery and praise; 9. Hoist with his own petard; 10. The self, the double, and the sense of self; 11. At the core at last: the primordial Jew; 12. Passing and wishing you were what you are not; 13. Authentic moments with the beautiful and sublime?; 14. The alchemist: role as addiction; 15. 'I love you': taking a bullet vs. biting one; 16. Boys crying and girls playing dumb; 17. Acting our roles: mimicry, makeup, and pills; 18. False (im)modesty; 19. Caught in the act; Afterword.

About the Author :
William Ian Miller is the Thomas G. Long Professor of Law at the University of Michigan Law School. He has also taught at Harvard, Yale, Chicago, and the Universities of Bergen and Tel Aviv. Professor Miller holds a J.D. and a Ph.D. in English, both earned at Yale. His various books, including most recently The Mystery of Courage (2000) and The Anatomy of Disgust (1997), have enjoyed critical acclaim throughout the world.

Review :
'... every page of this book shows an interesting, innovative, and extremely original mind at work.' Times Literary Supplement 'William Ian Miller ... scratches the itch of authenticity and relieves the ache of morality with delicious determination in Faking It.' The Boston Globe '... an erudite, accessible, and relentlessly lively book.' San Diego Tribune '... learned and deliciously discursive book ... Miller's academic specialty is, wonderfully, blood-feuds. So when it comes to apology, penance and forgiveness, he speaks with bitter, albeit theoretical, experience.' The Independent 'The book sheds a great deal of light on patterns of social behaviour in a way that will give all his readers pause for thought as they examine the recesses of their own identity and motivation.' Scientific and Medical Network Review '... a fascinating and highly entertaining account of the small and not so small deceptions, hypocrisies and downright fakes through which we live our lives ... Miller's jargon-free style, with its heavy reliance upon his own experiences of all these situations and more, is charming and immediately persuasive ... it is as a literary critic that Miller is most impressive ... he draws upon an ambitious range of names from across literature ... Miller's pithy contribution to the ongoing debate surrounding T. S. Eliot and anti-Semitism, in a chapter on the historically recurring fear that a Jew might 'pass' as Christian, is particularly insightful. There is plenty that is amusing and playful about the arguments presented in this book ... he has an eye for the seriousness of attempts to fake it too ... These short examples can do little justice to the massive scope that Miller sets out for this book ... Miller's demonstration of our dependence upon acts of fraud is invaluable in this field.' Manuscript