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Mark May, Australian hermit

YaooNews offers a brief item about an Australian hermit puzzle titled: “The Hermit of the Australian Bush: Mark May Lived Alone Off the Grid For 35 Years.” From the article:

“Mark May was an intelligent young Australian with a scholarship to study law. Instead, he fled society and lived alone in a remote gorge for 35 years. He passed away in 2017, taking his own thoughts on his choice with him.

“Since then, his family, the press and the world at large has been left trying to understand how, and why, the “hermit of Wild Rivers” rejected society.:”

URL: https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/hermit-australian-bush-mark-may-151359264.html

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Stephen Brandon, Scottish hermit

HeraldScotland news site, offers an item about a new hermit in the Scottish Episcopal church (from the headline): “Stephen Brandon is starting a life of quiet and relative seclusion in Helenburgh. He will be seen at St Michael and All Angels Church and a regular food shop. But otherwise he will devote the rest of his life to the centuries-old tradition.”

The article requires subscription for complete access.

URL: https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/25661590.helensburgh-diocesan-hermit-begins-new-life-seclusion/

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Silence, Solitude, & ancient Irish monks

RTE, national radio and televiion, Ireland, offers a short piece titled “What ancient Irish monks can teach us about silence, solitude and slowing down.” Abou the physical setting of the town of Gougane Barra, its historical monk St. Finabar, and includes an interview (6 min.) with psychiatry professor Brendan Kelly (Trinity College Dublin) on the value of stillness and silence.

URL: https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2025/0911/1532871-st-finbarr-gougane-barra-irish-monastic-tradition/

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Cioran: “Learning to be a Loser”

The website Psyche comments on the thought of the Romanian philosopher Emil Cioran (1911-1995) in an essay titled “Learning to be a loser: a philosopher’s case for doing nothing.” The article by Costica Bradatan maintains that Cioran followed the model of Diogenes of Sinope, the ancient Greek hermit and gadfly, in advocating a radical simplicity reducing daily life to non-action, thus liberating the individual to explore values and priorities. From the essay: “Like his ancient predecessor, the Cynic Diogenes of Sinope, Cioran turned his poverty into a badge of philosophical honour.”

Cioran is usually identified with Schopenhauer, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Beckett; he is the author of A History of Decay, The Temptation to Exist, and The Trouble With Being Born.

URL: https://psyche.co/ideas/learning-to-be-a-loser-a-philosophers-case-for-doing-nothing