Merab Mamardashvili

Merab Mamardashvili was a Soviet philosopher.

He was born in Gori (Eastern Georgia). In 1955 he graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of the Moscow State University. From 1968 to 1987 he was a deputy editor of the scientific journal "Voprosi Filosofii" ("Questions of Philosophy"). He became a professor of the Moscow State University and a senior research fellow of the Moscow Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Science. From 1987-1990 Mamardashvili was head of the Department of the Tsereteli Institute of Philosophy of the Georgian Academy of Sciences and Professor of the Tbilisi State University.

In his life only a few books were published, his lectures (for his style of lecturing he and others called them "dialogues" or "conversations" and he was called "Russian (or Georgian) Socrates") were taped and published after his death by his disciple Yuri Senokosov. Lecturing abroad, Mamardashvili gave talks in Germany, France, and other countries. He died from a heart attack at Moscow Vnukovo airport on November 25, 1990 and was buried in Tbilisi in a family grave on the Saburtalo cemetery.