Moral Minority Contemporary Conversations: Eleanor Russell on Simone Weil's Gravity & Grace
Jan 1, 2026
Eleanor Russell, a writer and academic at Northwestern University, dives into the mystical writings of Simone Weil. She shares how Weil's profound conversion shifted her focus from political philosophy to Christian mysticism. The conversation explores Weil's paradox that truth emerges through suffering and absence. Eleanor highlights Weil's radical thoughts on agency, virtue, and moral power, alongside her activism during politically turbulent times. They also discuss how Weil's unique perspectives resonate with contemporary issues of suffering and institutional critique.
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Presence Through Extreme Absence
- Simone Weil locates God's fullest presence at the extremities of absence, suffering, and grief.
- Love of God that persists without belief invites a manifesting of God's existence.
A Reader's Personal Entry Point
- Eleanor Russell came to Simone Weil as a search for 'weird women' and a model of vulnerability as method.
- She reads Weil through a post-structuralist lens, attentive to reception and misreadings.
Virtue As Compulsion Not Choice
- Weil inverts the Kantian 'ought implies can' by valuing compelled virtue over chosen virtue.
- Moral action becomes authentic when it issues from necessity rather than deliberate will.
