On the Anarchy of Poetry and Philosophy ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:54 PS PAGE i Series Board James Bernauer Drucilla Cornell Thomas R. Flynn Kevin Hart Jean-Luc Marion Adriaan Peperzak Richard Kearney Thomas Sheehan Hent de Vries Merold Westphal Edith Wyschogrod Michael Zimmerman ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:54 PS PAGE ii John D. Caputo, series editor PERSPECTIVES IN CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:55 PS PAGE iii ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:55 PS PAGE iv GERALD L. BRUNS On the Anarchy of Poetry and Philosophy A Guide for the Unruly F ORDHAM U NIVERSITY P RESS New York 2006 ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:55 PS PAGE v Copyright ᭧ 2006 Fordham University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bruns, Gerald L. On the anarchy of poetry and philosophy : a guide for the unruly / Gerald L. Bruns. p. cm.— (Perspectives in continental philosophy) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN-13: 978-0-8232-2632-0 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8232-2632-8 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-8232-2633-7 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-8232-2633-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Aesthetics. 2. Art—Philosophy. 3. Poetry. 4. Poetry—History and criticism. I. Title. BH39.B795 2006 111Ј.85—dc22 2006035284 Printed in the United States of America 08 07 06 5 4 3 2 1 First edition ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:55 PS PAGE vi For Marjorie and Joe Perloff ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:55 PS PAGE vii Human life, distinct from juridical existence, existing as it does on a globe isolated in celestial space, from night to day and from one coun- try to another—human life cannot in any way be limited to the closed systems assigned to it by reasonable conceptions. The immense travail of recklessness, discharge, and upheaval that constitutes life could be expressed by stating that life starts with the deficit of these systems; at least what it allows in the way of order and reserve has meaning only from the moment when the ordered and reserved forces liberate and lose themselves for ends that cannot be subordinated to any thing one can account for. It is only by such insubordination—even if it is impoverished—that the human race ceases to be isolated in the uncon- ditional splendor of material things. —Georges Bataille, ‘‘The Notion of De´pense’’ ................. 16257$ $$FM 11-13-06 14:28:56 PS PAGE viii Contents Acknowledgments xi Abbreviations for Frequently Cited Texts xiii Preface xxiii P ART O NE:THE M ODERNIST S UBLIME 1 Modernisms—Literary and Otherwise: An Introduction 3 2 Ancients and Moderns: Gadamer’s Aesthetic Theory and the Poetry of Paul Celan 33 P ART T WO:FORMS OF P AGANISM 3 Foucault’s Modernism: Language, Poetry, and the Experience of Freedom 57 4 Poetic Communities 79 5 Francis Ponge on the Rue de la Chausse´e d’Antin 106 6 The Senses of Augustine: On Some of Lyotard’s Remains 133 P ART T HREE:ANARCHIST P OETICS 7 Anarchic Temporality: Writing, Friendship, and the Ontology of the Work of Art in Maurice Blanchot’s Poetics 155 ix ................. 16257$ CNTS 11-13-06 14:28:57 PS PAGE ix 8 The Concepts of Art and Poetry in Emmanuel Levinas’s Writings 175 Notes 199 Bibliography 251 Index 269 x Contents ................. 16257$ CNTS 11-13-06 14:28:58 PS PAGE x Acknowledgments Some half-dozen pages of chapter 2, ‘‘Ancients and Moderns: Ga- damer’s Aesthetic Theory and Paul Celan’s Poetry,’’ first appeared in an essay, ‘‘The Hermeneutical Anarchist: Phronesis, Rhetoric, and the Experience of Art,’’ in Gadamer’s Century: Essays in Honor of Hans- Georg Gadamer, ed. Jeff Malpas, Ulrich Arnswald, and Jens Kerscher (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002). Chapter 3, ‘‘Foucault’s Mod- ernism: Language, Poetry, and the Experience of Freedom,’’ first ap- peared in The Cambridge Companion to Foucault, ed. Gary Gutting, 2d ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005). Chapter 4, ‘‘Poetic Communities,’’ first appeared in the Iowa Review 32, no. 1 (Spring 2002). Chapter 5, ‘‘Francis Ponge on the Rue de la Chausse´e d’Antin,’’ first appeared in Comparative Literature 53, no. 3 (Summer 2001). Chapter 6 first appeared as ‘‘The Senses of Augustine (On Some of Lyotard’s Remains)’’ in Religion and Literature 32, no. 3 (Au- tumn 2001). Chapter 7 first appeared as ‘‘Anarchic Temporality: Writing, Friendship, and the Ontology of the Work of Art,’’ in The Power of Contestation: Essays on Maurice Blanchot, ed. Geoffrey Hart- man and Kevin Hart (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). Chapter 8, ‘‘The Concepts of Art and Poetry in Emman- uel Levinas’s Writings,’’ first appeared in The Cambridge Companion to Levinas, ed. Simon Critchley and Robert Bernasconi (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). Thanks to all for permission to reproduce this material. xi ................. 16257$ $ACK 11-13-06 14:29:00 PS PAGE xi I’m especially grateful to many colleagues and friends—too many, really, to enumerate. But particular thanks to those that prompted me to write the various portions of this book: Ulrich Arnswald, Rob- ert Bernasconi, Simon Critchley, Jim Dougherty, Gary Gutting, Geoffrey Hartman, and Kevin Hart. Thanks also to anonymous readers for Comparative Literature and Fordham University Press, to R. M. Berry, Jr., and to David Hamilton, editor of the Iowa Review. Special thanks to Steve Fredman. And love to Nancy and Jacob, Anne, Andy, and Eloise, Marga and Wes, and John and Alicia. xii Acknowledgments ................. 16257$ $ACK 11-13-06 14:29:01 PS PAGE xii Abbreviations for Frequently Cited Texts Theodore Adorno AeT Aesthetic Theory. Trans. Robert Hullot-Kentor. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. AT A¨ sthetische Theorie. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1973. David Antin tb talking at the boundaries. New York: New Directions, 1976. wim what does it mean to be avant-garde. New York: New Directions, 1990. Antonin Artaud AA Antonin Artaud: Selected Writings. Ed. Susan Sontag. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. ŒA Œuvres comple`tes. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1956. TD Le theater et son double. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1964. Georges Bataille AM The Absence of Myth: Writings on Surrealism. Trans. Michael Richardson. London: Verso, 1994. xiii ................. 16257$ ABBR 11-13-06 14:29:08 PS PAGE xiii AS The Accursed Share: An Essay on General Economy. Trans. Rob- ert Hurley. New York: Zone Books, 1988. CS The College of Sociology. Ed. Dennis Hollier. Trans. Betsy Wing. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988. ExI L’expe´rience inte´rieure. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1943. IE Inner Experience. Trans. Leslie Anne Boldt. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1988. OC Œuvres comple`tes. 12 v. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1970–1988. PM La part maudite, precede de la notion de´pense. Paris: E´ ditions de Minuit, 1967. VE Visions of Excess: Selected Writings, 1927–1939. Trans. Allan Stoekl. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1985. Charles Baudelaire Œ.2 Œuvres comple`tes. 2d ed. Ed. Claude Pichois. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1976. SWA Selected Writings on Art and Literature. Trans. P. E. Charvet. London: Penguin Books, 1972. Walter Benjamin AC The Arcades Project. Trans. Howard Eiland and Kevin McLaughlin. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. CB Charles Baudelaire: A Lyric Poet in the Era of High Capitalism. Trans. Harry Zohn. London: Verso, 1973. GS Gesammelte Schriften. 7v. Ed. Rolf Tiedemann and Herman Schweppenha¨user. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1972. SW1 Selected Writings, 1: 1913–1926. Ed. Marcus Bullock and Mi- chael W. Jennings. Trans. Edmund Jephcott et al. Cam- bridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996. SW2 Selected Writings, 2: 1927–1934. Ed. Marcus Bullock and Mi- chael W. Jennings. Trans. Edmund Jephcott et al. Cam- bridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999. SW3 Selected Writings, 3: 1935–1938. Ed. Howard Eiland and Mi- chael W. Jennings. Trans. Edmund Jephcott et al. Cam- bridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2002. SW4 Selected Writings, 4: 1938–1940. Ed. Howard Eiland and Mi- chael W. Jennings. Trans. Edmund Jephcott et al. Cam- bridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003. xiv Abbreviations for Frequently Cited Texts ................. 16257$ ABBR 11-13-06 14:29:08 PS PAGE xiv Maurice Blanchot A L’amite´. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1971. AM L’arreˆt de mort. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1948. AO L’attente, l’oubli. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1962. AWO Awaiting Oblivion. Trans. John Gregg. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. BC The Book to Come. Trans. Charlotte Mandel. Stanford: Stan- ford University Press, 2003. CI La communaute´ inavouable. Paris: E´ ditions du Minuit, 1983. DS Death Sentence. Trans. Lydia Davis. Barrytown, NY: Station Hill Press, 1978. ED L’e´criture du de´sastre. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1980. EI L’entretien infini. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1969. EL L’espace litte´raire. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1955. F Friendship. Trans. Elizabeth Rottenberg. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. Fp Faux pas. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1943. FP Faux pas. Trans. Charlotte Mandel. Stanford: Stanford Uni- versity Press, 2001. GO The Gaze of Orpheus and Other Literary Essays.Trans.Lydia Davis. Barrytown, NY: Station Hill Press, 1981. IC The Infinite Conversation. Trans. Susan Hanson. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993. LV Le livre a` venir. Paris: E´ ditions Gallimard, 1959. PD Le pas au–dela´.