Derrida, Literature and War: Absence and the Chance of MeetingDerrida, Literature and War argues for the importance of the relation between absence and chance in Derrida's work in thinking today about war and literature. Sean Gaston starts by marking Derrida's attempts to resist the philosophical tradition of calculating on absence as an assured resource, while insisting on the (mis)chances of the chance encounter. Gaston re-examines the relation between the concept of war and the chances of literature by focusing on narratives of conflict set during the Napoleonic wars. These chance encounters or duels can help us think again about the sovereign attempt to leave the enemy nameless or to name what cannot be named in the midst of wars without end. His study includes new readings of a range of writers, including Aristotle, Hume, Rousseau, Schiller, Clausewitz, Thackeray, Tolstoy, Conrad, Freud, Heidegger, Blanchot, Foucault, Deleuze and Agamben. Offering an authoritative reading of Derrida's oeuvre and new insights into a range of writers in philosophy and literature, this is a timely and ambitious study of philosophy, literature, politics and ethics. |
Contents
A Series of Intervals | 1 |
CALCULATING ON ABSENCE | 13 |
LA CHANCE DE LA RENCONTRE | 77 |
Notes | 159 |
Bibliography | 184 |
Index | 213 |
Other editions - View all
Derrida, Literature and War: Absence and the Chance of Meeting Sean Gaston No preview available - 2009 |
Derrida, Literature and War: Absence and the Chance of Meeting Sean Gaston No preview available - 2009 |
Common terms and phrases
absolute absurdity Agamben Alan Bass Chicago anonymity Aristotle battle Beaufret bizarre calculating on absence Cambridge chance encounter chance meeting Charlotte Mandell Chicago Press Clausewitz concept Critique D'Hubert David death Democritus Derrida suggests Dialogues diaphanous Éditions du Seuil Éditions Galilée Elizabeth Rottenberg Stanford Emmanuel Levinas essay Feraud Frankfurt am Main Freud Geoffrey Bennington Geschlecht Giovanna Borradori Grammatology Hegel Heidegger's Henceforth cited Husserl interview intro Inventions de l'autre Jacques Derrida Janicaud Jean-Luc Nancy Joseph Conrad Kamuf and Elizabeth Lacoue-Labarthe Lévinas literature logos London Martin Heidegger Maurice Blanchot Metaphysics Michael Naas mis)chance Napoleon narrative never Nietzsche Paul Celan Peace Peggy Kamuf Penguin phenomenology Plato potentiality Psyche pure possibility question reading relation rencontre Rostov Rousseau Sartre says sense series of intervals sovereign sovereignty Stanford University Stanford University Press story thinking thought tion Tolstoy trans translation University of Chicago violence vols Paris Wallenstein Writing and Difference York