A. Szafraniec, Beckett, Derrida, and the Event of Literature

Asja SZAFRANIEC, Beckett, Derrida, and the Event of Literature

Palo Alto, Stanford University Press, 2007, 264 p.
ISBN-10 0804754578
ISBN-13 9780804754576


RÉSUMÉ

The late Jacques Derrida's notion of literature is explored in this new study. Starting with Derrida's self-professed inability to comment on the work of Samuel Beckett, whom Derrida nevertheless considered one of the most interesting and exemplary writers of our time, Asja Szafraniec argues that the shared feature of literary works as Derrida understands them is a double, juridical-economical gesture, and that one aspect of this notion (the juridical) is more hospitable to Beckett's oeuvre than the other. She then discusses other contemporary philosophical approaches to Beckett, including those of Gilles Deleuze, Stanley Cavell, and Alain Badiou. The book offers an innovative analysis of Derrida's approach to literature, as well as an overview of current philosophical approaches to contemporary literature, and a number of innovative readings of Beckett's work.


BIOGRAPHIE

Asja Szafraniec obtained her Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Amsterdam. She is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Amsterdam.