2. 1
Let’s Think About Love
Take yourself to a time when you felt you knew love. Can you describe that feeling for
yourself? (Write this down, we will too.) answer here Did you ever find yourself declaring that
love to whom it was addressed? (This declaration need not be of the first time you shared this
with them, it can be any instance of this—whatever comes to mind.) answer here How did you
feel when you shared those feelings? answer here Do you feel as though your love was
communicated fully? answer here
Instead of sharing just my own responses, I decided it would be more suitable if I had a conversation about it with
someone I love deeply. These are our responses. (First: myself; Second: John)
—This love I feel now, simply put, feels very different from anything that I’d ever felt before (and I
thought I knew love before this). The physical feeling this love sparks in me is a sort of tightness in my
chest, as though I need to gasp for air, but not in a way that feels difficult. It’s more like my sense of my
heart and lungs is heightened. I heard someone say once, “I’m grounded atop a cloud.” That’s what this
feels like.
—For me it feels like I’m frozen in time. My heart feels like it’s being squeezed or burning. It feels like I’d
do anything, sacrifice anything, in order to show you that I love you. And you know, you always see me
doing this—sometimes I’ll even start to shake my head in disbelief because I just cannot believe how lucky
I am to feel this way.
—Yes, what sticks out most for me is when I came to visit you in Colorado for our anniversary last
October.
—Yea me too, when we went on that walk to the river before the sun had set.
—I felt this weird rush; I felt almost like it was the first time I came to visit you before we’d started
dating.
—I felt really good and really happy that I had someone to share these feelings with.
—There’s no way my feelings were properly communicated! I said what I could—I explained that you
(and still do) brightened my perspective on day-to-day life, that you helped me regain a sort of faith in
myself and, in some ways, other people too. But, there was nothing I could say to truly pour my heart out
to you, and I still can’t! I tried my best to embrace this though. Remember how I’d keep saying that even
though I’ll never be able to tell you with my words, this is the “best part” of it because I’ll be forced to
keep telling you, over and over again.
—No. Everything that I said or tried to say didn’t come close to what I was trying to convey. Not even a
kiss felt like it could do it.
3. 2
What do I think of love? —As a matter of fact, I think nothing at all of love. I'd be glad to know what it is, but being
inside, I see it in existence, not in essence. What I want to know (love) is the very substance I employ
in order to speak (the lover's discourse). [...] I cannot hope to seize the concept of it
except “by the tail”: by flashes, formulas, surprises of expression, scattered through the great
stream of the Image-repertoire; I am in love's wrong place, which is its dazzling place:
“The darkest place, according to a Chinese proverb, is always underneath the lamp.”
~ Roland Barthes, A Lover’s Discourse 59
To try to speak of love—to define it—is to assume that it can be reduced to language, to a
direct and solid meaning. We cannot. In the fragment above, Barthes signals that it is impossible
to “seize” a total understanding of love. “I see it in existence, not in essence,” he writes. Love
has no essence to be defined; it is a fugitive to language, never to be grasped and ceaselessly
shattering meaning. In any case, there is still something we are faced with—even if scarcely a
glimmer or a spark—in love. To be in love is to be in what Barthes calls “love’s wrong place.”
That is to say, being in love engenders a state of atopos in which the lover is destabilized by1
their encounter with the unknown. Further, much like Barthes proverbial reference, love is
something we all think we know, but really it remains incommensurable.
Whereas love cannot be ascribed a definition, there still remains an exhaustive
philosophic discourse centered around its significance within the realm of human experience as
well as its impact on the lover. Belonging to this discourse are a stretch of texts written by
French theorists Jean-Luc Nancy and Maurice Blanchot, respectively. Following the 1983
publication of Nancy’s The Inoperative Community in Parisian literature review Aléa n°4 and
onward throughout the 1980s, Nancy and Blanchot were engulfed in an exchange of works on
the theme of community. By way of this, the scope of this exchange grew from just the subject of
1
To define the term atopos (from the Ancient Greek, ἄτοπος), we can separate it into two parts: a + topos = no +
place. Atopos, thus, can be translated to mean no-place(ness).
4. 3
community to subjects of politics, literature, writing, and love. Thirty years later, Nancy
concludes the exchange with the release of La communauté désavouée (The Disavowed
Community) in 2014 (English: 2016). In this book, Nancy finally responds to—and even does a
profoundly close reading—of Blanchot’s La communauté inavouable (The Unavowable
Community) from 1983 as well. His goal in writing this was to, albeit belatedly, come to a
suitable understanding both of Blanchot’s assertions as well as the reproach he directs at Nancy
throughout.
In order to come to an understanding of my own regarding the experience and
significance of love, I directed my attention toward “the first explicit discussion of love in
western literature and philosophy” (Nehemas 1989, xiv): Plato’s Symposium. Set in 416 BCE,
the Symposium chronicles a drinking party in which seven prominent Athenians (particularly
Socrates and Alcibiades) discuss their beliefs concerning Eros (ἔρος)—the hellenic god of love
and desire. After some time, reading, and very much thought, I reached out to Jean-Luc Nancy
with intent to discuss the intersections of love, the Symposium, his earlier works, and his
prolonged exchange with Blanchot that culminates in The Disavowed Community. In February,
2020, I was able to conduct a two part video-interview with Jean-Luc Nancy during which he2
provided a wealth of insight on these questions, namely that of love—from both his own
perspective and his impression of Blanchot's. Drawing from this thirty-year-long controversial
collaboration between Nancy and Blanchot , I aim to extract a description of love at once as3 4
2
This interview was conducted in French, transcribed, and translated by me. An abridged version of the interview (FR-EN side-by-side) follows
this essay. Online transcription software HappyScribe and online computer-assisted-translation software SmartCAT were utilized in the
production of the written interview. Please note that these software are designed to assist in the process of transcription/translation, not to be
confused with automatic software such as a translation app.
3
Most have referred to this exchange as a "controversy," (ie, Leslie Hill’s book on the subject entitled A Serious Controversy); however, I have
found that each of these thinkers' works challenged the other's conceptions of community, love, friendship, etc in numerous ways. Nonetheless, it
should be noted that Nancy’s beliefs—with less experience than Blanchot, 33 years his senior, at the inception of this exchange—were
challenged.
5. 4
transient, atopic, and corporeal. Moreover, the works of Nancy and Blanchot come into play
alongside Plato’s Symposium for the substantiation of love as both impossible to renounce
(which Socrates so desperately desires) and, ultimately the essence/non-essence of community
itself.
Timeline of the Controversial Collaboration
The following element of this piece concisely retells the last 37 years' history as it
pertains to the philosophical discourse between Nancy and Blanchot. Likewise, this timeline of
sorts is supplemented by Nancy's modern-day impressions (as expressed in our interview) of
these affairs as they transpired.
Early 1983: The Debate’s Emergence
In 1983, the fourth issue of Parisian literature review Aléa published French philosopher
Jean-Luc Nancy’s essay entitled La communauté désœuvrée (The Inoperative Community). This5
piece was evidently inspired by Georges Bataille’s political thoughts surrounding the term
community. Likewise, The Inoperative Community was not only a rethinking of the term’s
political significance, but also a rethinking within the contexts of experience, social relations,
writing, and exposure—“Ego sum expositus (I am because I am exposed)” (Inoperative 1986,
31). This publication was the birth of a decades-long tug of war between Nancy and the late
4
I would also like to note that my research and assertions regarding this exchange have been greatly informed by the works of Ian James,
Jean-Luc Nancy scholar, and Leslie Hill, Maurice Blanchot (as well as Nancy) scholar. In 2006, James published The Fragmentary Demand: An
Introduction to the Philosophy of Jean-Luc Nancy which touches on Nancy’s writing over the years, as well as the way these works intersect with
other philosophers’ and events—including the exchange between him and Blanchot. In 2018, Leslie Hill put forth the book Nancy, Blanchot: A
Serious Controversy which delivers an extensive résumé of the exchange and whose scope of the controversy spans much farther than this project
aims to do. While there is no doubt that this book favours Blanchot over Nancy’s perspective, Hill nonetheless remains fair to both thinkers by
remaining rigorous in his explanation of the whole story.
5
NOTE: Seeing as most of the essay/book titles referenced throughout this text are very similar, I will at times choose to
shorthand titles using only their unique parts. For instance, The Inoperative Community → Inoperative; or The Unavowable
Community → Unavowable; etc.
6. 5
literary critic Maurice Blanchot. In the months since Aléa n°4 came out, Nancy received two
letters from Blanchot, who was decades farther along in his career and colleague to Georges
Bataille. According to Leslie Hill—writer of Nancy, Blanchot: A Serious Controversy (2018)—,
in these letters, Blanchot “indicate[d] his intention to address the question of Bataille’s politics
and expresse[d] a keen interest in Nancy’s Aléa essay” (Hill 2018, 249).6
Mid-Late 1983: Blanchot’s Response
Not long after, in Spring of 1983, Blanchot published a review of Marguerite Duras’
latest short novel La maladie de la mort (The Malady of Death) in literary review Le Nouveau
Commerce. Titled La maladie de la mort (éthique et amour), this review would very soon be
expanded into his book La communauté inavouable (The Unavowable Community). Published in
December 1983, a measly few months after the review from which it stems, The Unavowable
Community is divided into two parts—“The Negative Community” (“La Communauté
Négative”), and “The Community of Lovers” (“La Communauté des Amants”)—within which
he critiques and responds to Nancy’s The Inoperative Community by contemplating the
feasibility of an actual community while speculating the paradoxical gesture that would be its
avowal—that is to say the declaration, the ratification, the mere recognition of one's position
within a community would, by definition, negate the very attributes that make it one. Named
after the statement made by Georges Bataille, “The Negative Community,” etches the landscape
of the term in great depth: identifying the conditions of/for a community; noting the potential for
communities throughout history (such as Bataille's secret society Acéphale); and describing how
a community unfolds within the realms of politics, literature, friendship, and solitude. In “The
6
These letters, dated 4 Feb and 16 March 1983, only surfaced within the public sphere in October 2000 when they were
published in the 3rd edition of French literary review Lignes. I have not been able to access this publication, although Hill has
reproached Jean-Luc Nancy’s omission of them from his side of the story.
7. 6
Community of Lovers,” on the other hand, Blanchot recounts the Parisian riots of May 1968, an
example of a (negative) community rising due to political exigency. He then turns to
literature—namely Marguerite Duras’ archly-simplistic novella The Malady of Death—to
meditate on a microcosmic form of the community in all of its aporetic glory: romantic love .7
1986: La communauté désoeuvrée
Some years later in 1986, Nancy’s The Inoperative Community was published in book8
form with other related essays of his. This version of the essay was expanded and revised since
its first iteration in Aléa n°4. In this piece, Nancy posits a rethinking of the term community as it
stems from Georges Bataille’s thinking while also establishing be-ing under the Heideggerian
schema of being-with. According to Nancy scholar Ian James, Inoperative postulates how
“drawn [Nancy is] to the thinking of community as a shared relation to death which unworks any
communal assumption of identity or subjectivity. For both it is impossible to properly think
community on the basis of a community of subjects, since this isolates each singular existence in
its own autonomous sphere, and thereby suppresses the communal relation (shared finitude)”
(James 2006, 183-184). Ultimately , Nancy posits his conception of community as9
inoperative—or, rather, as an un-working—through a partial taking up and rejection of both
Bataille’s illustration of the intersection between community and death, as well as Martin
Heidegger’s theories surrounding death and being.
7
I am referring to love as a microcosmic form of a community because, generally speaking, love emerges between
two people rather than in a group. This also means that the facets of such a community may be more elevated.
However, I will explain this further in the sections to come.
8
The word inoperative (translated from désoeuvrée) has often been considered deficient in representing Nancy’s
claims in La communauté désoeuvrée. More specifically, within the word désoeuvrée can be found the word oeuvre
(which translates to work), and its prefix, dés-, translates to de- or un-. This leaves us with a more suitable
translation of the term: un-working.
9
Nancy also puts forth a response to Bataille’s conception of love & lovers within this postulation of community—however, we
will touch on this later on.
8. 7
Bataille articulates community as a shared “unproductive expenditure” (James 2006,
179), best represented through sacrifice—much like the schema for his secret society Acéphale.
Thus, “the structure of sacrifice, the ritual putting to death of another being, affirms a collective
relation to death insofar as those who carry out the sacrifice (and those who partake of the ritual
by bearing witness to it), also in a certain manner participate in the death of the one sacrificed”
(James 2006, 180). Nancy does affirm Bataille’s portrayal of one’s subjection to death as feasible
only through the death of the other; however, he does still reject Acéphale’s alleged element of
ritual sacrifice in that, while a community may rise in the death of an other, it still attempts to
make a work (oeuvre) of death to forge a community. He asserts death does not “operate the
dead being’s passage into some communal intimacy, nor does community, for its part, operate
the transfiguration of its death into some substance or subject” (Nancy 1991a, 15). In other
words, the other’s death places us, the community, in the face of our own finitude, but without
the presence of any “work” or “operation” to do anything further.
Nancy’s take on Bataille’s community is greatly influenced by his critical reading of
Heidegger’s Being and Time, namely his articulation of death—that we are all singularly10
beings-toward-death: “In its exposure to, or projection toward, an ungraspable finitude (death),
Dasein [the being-there] is always hors de soi [out of self], that is, without the intimacy or
self-posing foundation proper to subjectivity” (James 2006, 177). Furthermore, Nancy rejects
Heidegger’s denial of subjectivity—which is evident in Heidegger’s attempt to individualize the
experience of death —and nonetheless holds onto the notion that we are all beings-toward-11
10
“[...] death is necessarily that which is each time my own death, that toward which I alone am projected. Only once Dasein is
singularized in its projection toward death is it also a “being-with” others, and the relation I have to the death of others (...) is
never the same as the relation I have to my own death” (James 2006, 178).
11
As Ian James quotes from The Inoperative Community “ “All of Heidegger’s research into ‘being-for (or toward)-death’ was
nothing other than an attempt to state this: I is not—am not—a subject” (CD, 40; IC 14)” (James 2006, 177).
9. 8
death . Thus the community, composed of a multitude of singular beings-toward-death12
(Heidegger), rises so that these beings, as such, experience their shared finitude (Bataille) in the
face of something as incomprehensible as an other’s death. Moreover, in Nancy’s own words,
“what community reveals to me, in presenting to me my birth and my death, is my existence
outside myself. [...] Community does not sublate the finitude it exposes. Community itself, in
sum, is nothing but this exposition” (Nancy 1991a, 26).
A Lexiconic Divergence
In any case, Blanchot’s projection of the term (community) is not entirely in accordance
with that of Nancy in a number of ways. For instance, Nancy puts forth a concept of community
by way of its being “what happens to us [...] in the wake of society” or, in other words, the
unworking of the very work that would constitute a society (Nancy 1991a, 11). Blanchot pushes
back against this to say that a work (oeuvre) is not necessary for unworking (désoeuvrement) to
take place. This brings us to the question of absence in the works of Blanchot. Both thinkers put
forth their interpretation of Bataille's secret society Acéphale. Nancy labels the secret society as a
failure because it aims to make a “work of death” (Nancy 1991a, 20). Blanchot argues against
this to note that Acéphale was not a “failed community” that tries to make a project of death or
sacrifice, but that, in fact, the “failure of Acéphale would, in these terms, always be its success
since, as an absence of community or as a community of absence, it was never a question of a
communal project as such” in the way Nancy took it to be (James 2006, 189).
This divergence in the understanding of Acéphale—as a failed community (Nancy) or as
an absent one (Blanchot)—between the two thinkers highlights one of the—if not the—most
12
“The similitude of the like-being is made in the encounter of "beings toward the end" that this end, their end, in each case
"mine" (or "yours"), assimilates and separates in the same limit, at which or on which they compear” (Nancy 1991a, 33).
10. 9
fundamental conflicts concerning their theories of community. James asserts this variance
through their particular use of language to frame their respective iterations of community. On the
one hand, Nancy articulates community within an ontological framework and is unable to look13
outside of its bounds. He thus elaborates community as an “unworking of work” which is not
operative, not planned, and not calculated—as he describes Bataille’s Acéphale. It is evident to
Ian James that Nancy has misunderstood Bataille’s aim with his secret society because of their
fundamental lexical differences (while they both use the term “community,” Nancy seems to be
unaware that the two clearly do not mean it in the same way ). Further, Nancy fails “to detect14
the degree to which Bataille’s account of community already escapes the horizon of ontology,
since it is only ever a community of absence” (James 2006, 191) and moves on to articulate it as
a failed community. Bataille’s Acéphale is not a community of being-with, but rather—as
Blanchot explains—a community constituted by its very absence.
To explain, Blanchot takes to a Levinasian vocabulary, making use of his ethical
framework in place of an ontological one. James elucidates this on page 188 in a quote from
Blanchot’s Unavowable:
if the relation of man with man ceases to be that of the Same with the Same, but rather
introduces the Other as irreducible and — given the equality between them — always in
a situation of dissymmetry in relation to the one looking at that Other, then a completely
different relationship imposes itself and imposes another form of society which one
would hardly dare call a "community." Or else one accepts the idea of naming it thus,
while asking oneself what is at stake in the concept of a community and whether the
community, no matter if it has existed or not, does not in the end always posit the
absence of community. (Blanchot 1988, 3)
13
“a reworked and reinscribed Heideggerian language of the being-with of Dasein (Mitsein)” (James 2006, 188)
14
“pass[es] over the real relation which structures our encounter with others, that is, [...] the relation to [...] alterity prior to any
horizon of being” (James 2006, 190-1).
11. 10
Here, Blanchot explains his take on the question of a relation that forms the “absence of
community,” noting the relation between the self and the other; when the Other’s irreducible
alterity “imposes itself” upon the Self, this engenders a sort of violation of the “equality15
between” the two, leading the Self toward a state of dissymmetry because the Other’s alterity
never ceases to remain outside the realm of intelligibility. By way of the Other’s alterity as
out-of-reach for the Self rises an absent community or a community of absence. Evidently,16
Blanchot and Levinas stand in opposition to the lexicon of ontology—which includes terms of
being such as Heidegger’s being-with, being-there, etc.
However, Blanchot’s response to Nancy is not uniquely one of critique; rather, he
elucidates both where their thoughts on community converge in addition to where they diverge.
Hill notes a number of corresponding points between the two, namely that “as “the community of
finite beings [des êtres finis] and, as such, itself as finite community, that is, not a limited
community when compared with infinite or absolute community, but the community of finitude
because finitude ‘is’ communal [communautaire] and because nothing other than finitude is
communal.” ” (Hill 2018, 74). He also notes that the two are in accordance that this concept of
community has a dangerous tendency to lean toward a fusional immanence—that is to say, a
communion which, unlike the community, would demand that its members take on one
collective identity .17
15
Levinasian Alterity (Fr. Alterité) defined in The Nancy Dictionary: “Western ontology in Levinas's account cannot bear witness to the central
site of the ethical, namely the face-to-face relation. In this relation [...] there is an unassimilable alterity of the Other who cornes to me and who is
higher than height. This Other cannot be quantified under any given register or identified through ontological claims. [...] The site of the
face-to-face relation, for Levinas, is always one of peace and hospitality for the Other, and this absolute alterity is what gives meaning to our
attempts to attend to the other through finite rules and responses” (Gratton 2015, 141).
16
“If others are always experienced as a radical alterity or as a transcendence inassimilable to any horizon of being as such, can
community be thought in terms of “being-with”? Must it not always be a community thought, not in terms of its coming to
presence but rather in terms of its absence?” (James 2006, 189).
17
The communion “[...] fuses the egos into an Ego or a higher We” (Nancy 1991a, 15).
12. 11
2001: La communauté affrontée
As previously mentioned, neither Nancy nor Blanchot published an explicit response to
the other regarding love or community after La communauté désoeuvrée (The Inoperative
Community) was published in 1986 (English: 1991). Nevertheless, Nancy put forth La
communauté affrontée (The Confronted Community) in 2001 , twenty-five years later. Nancy18
notes the long hiatus in this essay: "I never quite clarified this reservation or this reproach [...] I
felt neither capable (and no more so today) nor authorized to elucidate the secret that Blanchot
clearly designates in his title" (Winfree 2009, 23). That being said, when I asked him to say a
few words about this piece, he explained:
“Affrontée, La communauté affrontée, c'était presque
une sorte de petit accident de parcours. Je ne me
rappelle même plus très bien comment c'est venu. Bon,
il est certain que dans La communauté affrontée, je l’ai
aussi un petit peu évoqué, mais je me rappelle même
plus ce livre... ” (Can be found in Row 2.3; Interview
Appendix)
“Confronted, The Confronted Community was almost a
sort of accident along the way. I can't even remember
very well how it came about. Well, it's certain that in
The Confronted Community, I also evoke some of the
same ideas, but I don't really remember that book
anymore…” (Can be found in Row 2.3; Interview
Appendix)
While it is a notably common occurrence for Nancy to say he doesn’t quite remember a19
published piece of his, this book never really gained popularity in the way the other two
(Inoperative and Unavowable) did. Moreover, aside from a few references, Confronted will20
henceforth be omitted from my analysis because it seems that Nancy wrote his most recent book
on the subject, La communauté désavouée (The Disavowed Community), with intent to nullify
and replace the former.
18
The book's namesake essay was also translated to English and published in The Obsessions of Georges Bataille:
Community and Communication (2009) which was edited/translated by Andrew J. Mitchell & Jason Kemp Winfree.
19
In addition to his noting this about The Confronted Community, he says this about Shattered Love in a video lecture titled
Jean-Luc Nancy. Love and Community. 2001 posted by The European Graduate School on YouTube (at 3:20). He also says this
about Shattered Love in my interview with him: “Ecoutez, franchement, je ne l'ai pas en mémoire, pas en mémoire (Listen,
honestly, I don’t quite remember it)” (Interview Appendix, Row 1.2).
20
Less than two years after Confronted was published, Maurice Blanchot passed away at the age of 95 on February 20th, 2003.
13. 12
2014: La communauté désavouée
After the “accident” (as he refers to it) that was The Confronted Community and
Blanchot’s passing in 2003, there came a sense of urgency for Nancy that was not present
beforehand. During our interview in February, he initially notes the “silly” anxiety and pressure
he felt about writing a truly thoughtful response to someone as distinguished as Blanchot. Later
on, he explains his thought process around finally deciding to write The Disavowed Community:
“Maintenant je reviens au trente ans passés tout
d'abord. C'est vrai, premièrement disons, disons une
chose toute bête et toute simple. Il y avait, tant que
Blanchot était là, vivant, sa présence était imposante et
il était d'autant plus respectable qu'il était âgé, qu'il
était malade, et cetera. Donc tout ça, ça me freiner.”
(Interview Appendix; Row 2.5)
“Before anything else, though, I'll return to the past
thirty years. It's true, first off, let's say something
entirely silly and entirely simple. As long as Blanchot
was here, alive, his presence was overwhelming and he
was all the more respectable in his old age and
consequently that he was sick, et cetera. So all this, it
held me back.” (Interview Appendix; Row 2.5)
“[...] je reviens au livre de Blanchot. Donc, à un
moment donné, je me suis dit "bon, c'est pas possible, il
faut crever l'abcès. Il faut que j'arrive à comprendre ce
que Blanchot a voulu dire." Donc je me souviens, c'est
pour ça que j'ai fait ce livre qui a une construction tout
à fait particulière, puisque c'est comme une
commentaire de texte, c'est un peu pénible, je crois.”
(IA; Row 2.9)
“[...] back to Blanchot's book. So, at a certain point, I
thought, "Well, come on, it's time to drain the abscess.
I have to come to an understanding of what Blanchot
wanted to say." So I remember, that's why I made this
book with such a particular construction. It's like a
literary commentary, it's a bit arduous, I think.”
(IA; Row 2.9)
The Disavowed Community, as Nancy notes, takes form as a remarkably thorough close reading
of Blanchot’s Unavowable with commentary throughout. While Nancy’s Disavowed is
multiplicitous in its construction, its overarching theme is his self-appointed imperative for
forging an understanding of Blanchot’s Unavowable; as Leslie Hill states, “[...] during the entire
thirty years since La Communauté inavouable was first published, nobody at all, including
himself, had yet properly read Blanchot’s volume as a whole, a task that, following the deaths of
Blanchot (2003), Duras (1996), Derrida (2004), and Lacoue-Labarthe (2007), he now considered
it his particular responsibility to fulfil” (Hill 2018, 9). In addition, following Blanchot’s initial
14. 13
reproach is Nancy’s reexamination of his ontologically framed notion of the unworking of work21
that catalyzes community.
21
As elucidated in subsection “A Lexiconic Divergence” p.8-10 of this paper.
15. 14
Jean-Luc Nancy: L’aveu de L’inavouable
The following section consists of (transcribed and translated) fragments from the
video-call interview I conducted with Jean-Luc Nancy in February of 2020. Throughout this
interview, I was able to ask him to speak about his experiences during this now-thirty-seven-year
period since "The Inoperative Community" was first published in Aléa n°4. Amidst these
fragments will be shorthand explanations to contextualize them within Nancy's The Disavowed
Community.
**Please note: (footnote)22
Following this is Nancy explaining the public response to Blanchot’s Unavowable as well as his own.
Jean-Luc Nancy
Mais, je dois dire que, donc toujours quelques
années après, je n'avais pas compris ce livre et
surtout, je crois—et c'est important de
remarquer—c'est que personne ne l'a expliqué. Je
n'en connais pas, je ne connais pas de commentaires
de ce livre. Alors, le titre, bien sûr. L'idée de La
communauté inavouable est devenu, même un peu
célèbre. [...] Mais, mais au fond, j'ai l'impression
que tout le monde a glissé, je dirais pudiquement
sur un livre qui paraissait très, très étrange.
Personne ne reconnaissait vraiment Blanchot là
dedans. Enfin, on ne savait pas de quel côté d'aller
avec ça. Bon, et moi, tout le premier, alors que ça
m'a été adressé—si vous voulez. Quand j'ai lu La
communauté inavouable, évidemment, j'ai compris.
Bien sûr que "oui, c'était adressé à moi." J'ai
compris aussi que Blanchot me faisait quelques
reproches, mais j'arrivais même pas très bien à
savoir lesquelles.
2.3 Jean-Luc Nancy
I have to say this, even this many years later, I did
not understand his book and, most importantly, I
think it's important to notice that no one explained it
either. I do not know any, I do not know any
commentaries on this book. I mean, the title, of
course. The idea of The Unavowable Community
became even a bit famous. [...] But, overall, I have
the impression that everyone slipped, I would say
modestly, onto a book that seemed very, very
obscure. No one really recognized Blanchot in
there. I mean, we didn't know where to go with it.
Especially not me, first of all, since it was
addressed to me—if you will. When I read The
Unavowable Community, evidently, I understood.
Of course, yes, it was addressed to me. But I also
understood that Blanchot had some reproach for
me, yet I couldn't quite grasp all of it.
22
1, dotted lines between rows indicate what would be a [...] in a block quote—that a portion of the interview was cut for the
purpose of maintaining pertinence and brevity within this section; 2, the center column denotes the corresponding row in the
Interview Appendix toward the end of this paper; 3, as this is a transcription of live speech, grammar will not always be perfect; 4,
if something is highlighted in green/red, this means that portion of text is incorrectly transcribed but cannot be corrected due to
especially unclear audio at those moments.
16. 15
Here Nancy explains a bit about how The Disavowed Community was constructed in response to his own lack of
understanding of Unavowable as well as how Blanchot’s circle responded to the publication.
Voilà un job, je reviens au livre de Blanchot. Donc,
à un moment donné, je me suis dit "bon, c'est pas
possible, il faut crever l'abcès. Il faut que j'arrive à
comprendre ce que Blanchot a voulu dire." Donc je
me souviens, c'est pour ça que j'ai fait ce livre qui a
une construction tout à fait particulière, puisque
c'est comme une commentaire de texte, c'est un peu
pénible, je crois. Ça a été très, très, très, très mal
reçu par les Blanchotiens—d'ailleurs le groupe des
amis de Blanchot dont je fais partie—ils sont
complètement fâché avec moi maintenant parce que
je crois que là, il y a un point aveugle pour moi.
Moi, je suis toujours, et je suis même de plus en
plus certains de ceux que j'ai dit là dedans et je
pense même que—et maintenant, j'ai vu même
comment ça se prolonge à travers Blanchot ailleurs
que dans ce livre. Mais je ne dis pas que ça affecte
tout Blanchot. C'est pas ça. Pas du tout, vraiment.
2.9 Here's a job, back to Blanchot's book. So, at a
certain point, I thought, "Well, come on, it's time to
drain the abscess. I have to come to an
understanding of what Blanchot wanted to say." So
I remember, that's why I made this book with such a
particular construction. It's like a literary
commentary, it's a bit arduous, I think. It's been
very, very, very, very badly received by the
Blanchotiens. Actually, Blanchot's group of
friends—of which I'm a part, by the way—they're
completely mad at me now. I think it's because I
have a blind spot here. I'm still...I'm even more
certain of what I said in my book and I even
think—and now, I've even seen how it extends
through Blanchot elsewhere than in this book. I'm
not saying it affects all of Blanchot’s works. That’s
not it, not at all really.
Nancy elaborating on Blanchot’s response to May 1968 and explaining the “first element” of Blanchot’s book (I
don’t think this is in accordance with the two-part construction of Blanchot’s book, but instead just focuses on two
major facets of it).
Athena
Oui, ça touche un peu sur l'idée de Mai '68, non?
2.10 Athena
Yes, it’s a bit related to the idea of May '68, Right?
Jean-Luc Nancy
Oui, exactement, bien sûr! Voilà, complètement.
C'est pour ça que dans La communauté
inavouable—je n'ai pas tout en résumé, si vous
voulez, mais—il y a deux grands points majeurs.
[...] Et ça, c'est l'objet de sa critique la plus vive et
la plus profonde. Premièrement, 68, il est interprété
comme ça, comme dissolution immédiate. Or, de ce
point de vue là, je dirais oui, je suis d'accord, mais
en même temps, 68 a aussi été—on pourrait presque
dire—le coup d'envoi de la fin de la politique, non
pas seulement en France. Alors, le '68 américain
était différent parce qu'il y avait l'opposition à la
guerre du Vietnam. Mais en tout cas, en Europe, on
peut dire oui; à partir de 68 est extrêmement
remarquable de 68, à commencer la lente bordure
de tout la politique européenne-mondiale, vers la
mondialisation. C'est l'époque du premier shoppe
pétrolier, etc. Alors donc, l'interprétation de 68 par
Blanchot, elle rentre dans une série de choses qui se
sont depuis répétée d'autres manières, c'est à dire
que on ne veut plus parler et on ne peut plus parler
2.11 Jean-Luc Nancy
Yes, exactly, of course! Voila, completely. That's
why in The Unavowable Community—I don't have
everything in brief, if you will, but—there are two
major points. And this is the object of his most
vivid and profound criticism. First, 68, it is
interpreted like this, as immediate dissolution. Now,
from this point of view, I would say yes, I agree,
but at the same time, 68 was also—one could
almost say—the kick-off of the end of politics, not
only in France. Of course, the American 1968 was
different because there was opposition to the
Vietnam War. But in any case, in Europe, we can
say yes, ever since 68—and this is extremely
remarkable—starting the slow restraint of all
European-world politics, towards a globalization.
This is the time of the first gas station, etc. So then,
Blanchot's interpretation of 68, it goes into a series
of things that have since been repeated in other
ways, that is to say that we no longer want to talk
and we can no longer talk about a revolutionary
outcome. One focuses on the moment of the
17. 16
d'un aboutissement révolutionnaire. On se concentre
sur le moment du soulèvement, par exemple les
mots révolte plutôt que révolution, insurrection et
soulèvement même. Par exemple, l'idée Berman a
fait l'an dernier, il y a deux ans, une grande
exposition sur l'idée de soulèvement. Très bien,
justement le soulèvement, le moment où ça se
soulève c'est le moment où la vague se lève et il
faut, en quelque sorte, il faut oublier qu'ensuite la
vague retombe. Et, maintenant, nous sommes dans
la retombée de la vague. Alors, ça c'est le premier
élément.
uprising, for example words like revolt rather than
revolution, insurrection, and even uprising. For
example, the idea Berman put forth two years ago, a
large exhibition on the idea of uprising. Very well,
precisely the uprising, the moment it heaves [se
soulève] is the moment when the wave rises. And,
in a way, we have to forget that what follows is the
crash of the wave. And, now, we are in the crashing
of the wave. So this is the first element, the second
element, not to simplify the second element of
Blanchot's book.
Following this is Nancy’s explanation of the “second” element of Unavowable in which he explains Blanchot’s
interest in the concept of absence within a very Christian lens.
Si on lit soigneusement ce livre, justement on
trouve quelque chose qui est assez différent de ce
qu'il y a partout ailleurs chez Blanchot. C'est à dire
que ailleurs, en général,—comment dire?—le point
de fuite, il est dans une évanescence complète, ça
disparaît. Les gens disparaissent; je veux dire, dans
les récits. Et, oui, dans la pensée de Blanchot aussi,
il s'agit toujours une sorte de point de fuite à l'infini
qu'il ne s'agit pas de rejoindre. Dans La
communauté inavouable, il y a quelque chose tout
de même d'assez différent, il y a le récit de
Marguerite Duras: le récit, dont la femme
est—comme le dit Blanchot lui même—elle est
identifié, [...].
Alors à ce moment là, il donne plusieurs noms de
figures féminines mythologique. Et finalement, il va
s'identifier au Christ qui disparaît en se donnant à
tous, en donnant son corps à tous et qu'il n'apparaît
ensuite que en disparaissant aux pèlerins d'Emmaüs.
Et donc, si on veut en effet le Christ d'Emmaüs
correspond tout à fait peut être à ceux dont Blanchot
veut parler en général, c'est à dire une figure qui
n'apparaît que en disparaissant. Mais la différence,
la différence, c'est que dans tout Blanchot, le seul
endroit où cette figure qui apparaît en disparaissant,
elle a quand même un nom. Elle a une situation
historique et culturelle très précise. C'est le Christ
de la religion chrétienne et ce Christ dans La
communauté inavouable, ce Christ vient prendre en
charge la femme du récit. C'est à dire, celle
qui—justement, dont c'est comme ça que Blanchot
peut passer de la femme au Christ—c'est elle qui a
donné son corps. Pour compliquer encore l'analyse,
peut être je ne l'ai même pas assez compliqué
puisque, justement, elle ne donne pas son corps,
2.12 It is that if we read this book carefully, we find
something that is quite different from what is
everywhere else in Blanchot. That is to say that
elsewhere, in general—how should I say this— the
vanishing point [point de fuite], is in a complete
evanescence, it disappears. People disappear; I
mean, in stories. And, yes, in Blanchot's thought
too, it is always a kind of vanishing [focal] point
toward the infinite which is not itself concerned
with joining. In The Unavowable Community,
there's something quite different, there is
Marguerite Duras' story: the story within which the
woman is—as Blanchot himself says—she is
identified, [...].
So at this time he gives several names of female
mythological figures. And finally, he will identify
himself with Christ who disappears in giving
himself to all, in giving his body to all and who will
not appear except in disappearing to the Pilgrims of
Emmaüs. And so, effectively, the Christ of Emmaüs
corresponds quite possibly to those of whom
Blanchot wants to speak in general, that is to say a
figure that appears only in its disappearance. But
the difference, the difference, is that in all of
Blanchot, the only place where this figure, that
appears in its disappearance, she still has a name.
She has a very precise historical and cultural
situation. It is the Christian religion's Christ and this
Christ in the unavowable community. This Christ
comes to take charge of the woman of the story.
That is to say,—precisely, which is how Blanchot
can pass from woman to Christ—the one who gave
her body. To further complicate this analysis,
maybe I didn't complicate it enough since,
precisely, she does not give her body, but if in
principle she gives it since she agrees, then she is
18. 17
mais si en principe elle le donne puisqu'elle est
d'accord, elle est d'accord pour coucher avec
l'homme. Je ne crois pas avec elle, mais n'empêche
que l'homme lui donnera du plaisir, ce plaisir auquel
lui, il ne peut pas prendre pas. Par de suite, il va
comprendre—comme Blanchot dit plus tard—il
comprendra une fois la femme disparue (peut-être
morte), comme les disciples d'Emmaüs, il
comprendra ce que c'était.
agreeing to sleep with the man. Regarding her, I
don’t really think so, lest the man provide her with
pleasure, that pleasure to which he can not take.
Afterwards, he will understand—as Blanchot later
says—he will understand once the woman has
disappeared (perhaps dead), like The Disciples of
Emmaüs, only then will he understand what it was.
Here, Nancy on the concept of the unavowable. In 2.13, he touches on the structure of this idea within realms such
as the political.
[...] De quelque chose inavouable, d'ailleurs
Blanchot en reparle un peu, bon. Qui a dit Blanchot,
une portée politique—il emploie le mot et il le
répète vers la fin—quelque chose d'inavouable qui a
une portée politique. Et ce quelque chose, on ne
peut pas l'indiquer autrement qu'à travers une figure
mythique et mystique. Et donc à ce moment là on a
quelque chose qui a quand même toujours la
structure profonde, si vous voulez, d'un fascisme.
C'est absolument pur de toute grossièreté,
évidemment raciste, etc. [pause] Et en fait, je dis
même pas ça pour critiquer Blanchot. Là où
Blanchot veut surtout éviter toute institution de la
communauté, là il posent quelque chose qui est en
quelque sorte qui est archi-institutionnel, qui n'est
pas institutionnel, si on veut, mais qui est fondateur.
Et en tant que fondateur, évidemment, ne peut être
que mythique et mystique.
2.13 [...] About "something" unavowable, [....] a political
significance—he employs this word and repeats it
again towards the end—something unavowable
which has a political significance. And this
"something," we cannot signify it as anything other
than by means of a mythic and mythical creature.
And so at this moment here, we have something
which, nevertheless, still has the profound structure
of, if you will, of a fascism. It's absolutely devoid of
vulgarity, racism, etc. [long pause] And, in fact, I
don't even mean this to critique Blanchot. The place
where Blanchot wants to, above all, avoid all
institutions of the community, is the place where he
puts forth something which is, in a way,
archly-institutional, which is not institutional, but
rather is foundational. And as foundational,
obviously, this can only be mythical and mystical.
Here, Nancy elaborates on how Blanchot (as well as Blachot/Nancy scholar Leslie Hill) affirms that this concept
of the unavowable can be cited from the works of Bataille, but Nancy cannot seem to locate it, saying that the
location is never explicitly cited. In any case, he turns towards speaking about Bataille’s avowal (L’aveu de
Bataille).
Pour revenir à l'inavouable: Premièrement, je vous
signale que Leslie Hill, il a écrit dans cette
conférence à Oxford que La communauté
inavouable se trouvait chez Bataille, mais il ne
donne pas de référence, alors je lui est demandé s'il
avait une référence parce que moi, j'en trouve pas
chez Bataille. Et Michel Surya, grand spécialiste de
Bataille, il m'a dit non plus qu'il ne voit pas. Je peux
très bien imaginer que Bataille ait un jour employer
l'expression. Mais à ce moment là, je dirais presque,
pourquoi est ce que Blanchot ne reconnaît pas la
provenance chez Bataille, l'expression? Alors, je
crois que pour répondre, c'est que chez Bataille en
effet l’aveu c'est très, très important. Il y a même un
2.14 To return to the unavowable: Firstly, I would like to
note that during this conference at Oxford, Leslie
Hill wrote that the unavowable community could be
found in Bataille, but he doesn’t provide any
reference. So I asked him if he had a reference,
because I could not find out. Even Michel Surya,
expert in Bataille, told me that he couldn’t find one
either. I can very well imagine that Bataille would
one day use this expression. But now, I’d like to ask
why Blanchot didn’t quote this reference, this
expression from Bataille. So, to respond, I think
that in Bataille the avowal (l'aveu) is very, very23
important. There's even a book titled L'aveu,
although the concept is all over Bataille’s works.
23
Definition of avow (v.); “to declare openly, bluntly, and without shame” (Merriam-Webster n.d).
19. 18
texte qui s'appelle L’aveu, mais il y a de l’aveu
partout chez Bataille d'ailleurs. Et qu'est ce que c'est
que l’aveu chez Bataille? L’aveu, c'est l’aveu
du—c'est toujours l’aveu de la misère de la..(ce
dirait)...pour prendre seulement juste deux mots,
d'un côté, c'est l’aveu de l'obscénité comme Mme
Edwarda, etc. Et parallèlement, c'est l’aveu du
non-savoir. Mais d'un savoir, qui n'est pas un
manque à savoir, mais qui est en quelque sorte un
savoir de l'absence radicale et fondamentale de
savoir. Donc l’aveu de Bataille c'est l’aveu de
quelque chose, en quelque sorte, d'insupportable
parce que le non-savoir n'est pas supportable, et ça
veut dire le non-savoir du sens.
And what is this avowal in Bataille? The avowal is
an avowal of...to use only two words to describe it,
there's the avowal of obscenity—like Madame
Edwarda, etc—and there's also the avowal of not
knowing (le non-savoir). But of a knowing which is
not a lack of knowledge, but which is in a way a
knowledge of the radical and fundamental absence
of knowing. Thus Bataille's 'avowal' is the
avowal/affirmation of something, in a sense,
unbearable because not knowing is not bearable and
this means that not knowing of meaning/purpose.
Here, Nancy moves on from Bataille’s unavowable to Blanchot’s to posit his thinking in regard to literature and
the political. After 2.16, I ask Nancy about how Blanchot’s representation of community as unavowable relates to
the Heideggerian idea that we are all beings-toward-death to which Nancy responds, noting the difference between
death and dying for Blanchot.
The rest of the following rows will not have prior explanation as this row and those prior do. My side of the
interview will henceforth be included to provide context.
L’aveu. L’aveu de Bataille, c'est l’aveu au fond de
ce que Bataille appelle la "négativité sans emploi."
Qui est pour Bataille l'équivalent de la souveraineté.
Or, en ne prenant pas du tout cette piste là, en
laissant l'inavouable comme ça suspendu sans aveu,
en quelque sorte, chez Blanchot. Mais en même
temps, on ne peut pas dire—on ne peut pas laisser
l'inavouable suspendu parce que si je vous dis qu'il
y a là quelque chose d'inavouable, vous comprenez
forcément qu'il y a quelque chose à avouer. C’est
même pas dit inavouable. On peut dire seulement
qu’on en sait rien du tout; inavouable, c'est pas
comme invisible. Que si on veut invisible, ça veut
dire que on devrait pouvoir le dire. Inavouable, c'est
que c'est trop honteux, c'est trop horrible, c'est trop
pas, c'est trop sale tout ce qu'on voudra pour être
dit. Mais c'est quelque chose.
Alors que chez Blanchot, justement, tout le sale, le
bas, etc est en fait remplacé par du creo (cité d’un
des titres de Blanchot), par l'élévation de la femme
et du Christ. Et le possible salut, disons, de l'homme
par la reconnaissance. Donc, voilà, là il y à une
opération de Blanchot qui dit que là, juste là, il n'a
pas pu, n'a pas pu se séparer d'une postulation
comme ça, archi-politique. Vous savez, on peut
renvoyer tous les textes dans lesquels Blanchot, il y
a deux écritures l'écriture littéraire avec l'écriture du
jour politique. Je crois qu'il y a quelque chose
comme une sorte de politique mystique, si vous
voulez, de la littérature, ou plus exactement, il
2.16 The avowal. Bataille's avowal is the avowal at the
end of what he calls "negativity without application
[négativité sans emploi]." Which is, for Bataille,
the equivalent of sovereignty. Now, in not taking
that lead at all, in leaving the
unavowable—suspended, with no avowal, in a way,
within Blanchot. But at the same time, we cannot
say—we cannot leave the unavowable in
suspension because if I tell you that there's
something unavowable there, you expressly
understand that there's something to avow. It's not
even labeled unavowable. We can only say that we
know nothing about it at all; unavowable, is not like
invisible. If you will, invisible means that we
should be able to say it. Unavowable, it means that
it's too shameful, it's too horrible, it's too not, it's
too dirty everything we want to be said. But it's
something.
Whereas in Blanchot, precisely, all the dirty, the
low, etc. is in fact replaced by the creo (cited from
one of Blanchot’s pieces), by the elevation of the
woman and of Christ. And the possible salvation,
say, of man through recognition. Thus, here there is
an operation of Blanchot that says that here, right
here, he could not separate himself from a
postulation in this way archly-political. You know,
we can return to all the texts in which Blanchot,
there are two works—literary writing and daily
political writing. I believe that there is something of
a mystical politics, if you will, of literature, or more
precisely, it should be said that in Blanchot, it is
20. 19
faudrait dire chez Blanchot, c'est même de la
disparition de la littérature. Pour Blanchot, la
littérature disparaît comme la communauté. Donc,
au fond ce que je crois que c'est quand même
nécessaire de mettre en question c'est un risque de
idéalisme. Je ne dis pas que Blanchot est nihiliste,
même on peut dire c'est le contraire. Mais, c'est un
contraire au moins extrêmement proche.
even the disappearance of literature. For Blanchot,
literature disappears like the community. So
basically what I think is necessary to question is a
risk of idealism. I'm not saying Blanchot is
nihilistic, we can even say he's the opposite. But,
this is an at least extremely close opposite.
Athena
Oui, c'est très intéressant parce que c'est il tourne un
peu. D'un idée de Heidegger. C’est que Heidegger
dit que nous sommes des êtres vers la mort. Et oui,
exactement, ce qu’il montre, Blanchot, c'est pas
forcément ça, mais c'est plutôt que la mort est
toujours déjà imposée plutôt que c'est quelque chose
qu'on se dirige vers.
Jean-Luc Nancy
Alors ce que vous avez dit c'est— la mort, c'est à?
Athena
C'est que la mort, c'est imposé sur les êtres humains
[finies].
2.17 Athena
Yes, it's very interesting because he turns a little bit
toward one of Heidegger's ideas. It's his idea that
we are all beings-toward-death. And yes, what
Blanchot is projecting isn't necessarily that, but it's
more so that death is always already imposed rather
than something we're headed for.
Jean-Luc Nancy
So what you’re saying is that death is toward…?
Athena
It’s that death, it’s imposed on human [finite]
beings.
Jean-Luc Nancy
Ah oui, oui. Très compliqué, ça chez Blanchot.
Chez Blanchot d'abord, le mourir est plus important
que la mort. La mort même, je pense même qu'il y a
des textes où Blanchot dit la mort—pour en parler
on ne sait même pas ce que c'est que la mort, mais
le mourir ça veut dire le pas être en train de passer à
la limite. Oui, on n'en finit pas seulement. Là, on est
à un point vraiment extrêmement délicat et
compliqué. Mais là, on peut dire à la fois le mourir
va inévitablement justement vers la mort, bien sur.
Vers rien de qu'on n'en revient pas, il n'y a rien à
redire, il n'y a pas de sens, etc. En même temps, ça,
c'est quelque chose qui est peut être plutôt, en fait,
qu'on pourrait trouver chez Heidegger, puis après
Heidegger il s'est tourné tout à fait autrement, mais
qu'on peut travailler autrement c'est que la mort,
c'est la possibilité de l'impossible. Mais l'impossible
ça ne veut pas dire ce à quoi on arrive pas. Ça veut
dire ce qui est en dehors du possible. Il n'est plus
question du possible. Bon, alors ça veut dire aussi
que la mort c'est de deux choses l'une, ou bien on
peut la comprendre avec la vie comme il essaye de
faire Derrida en parlant de La vie-La mort un seul
2.18 Jean-Luc Nancy
Oh, yes, yes. This is very complicated within
Blanchot. First off, for Blanchot, dying [le mourir]
is more important than death [la mort]. Death itself,
I think there are texts where Blanchot says that
death—to speak of it although we don't even know
what death is. But dying, that means the not-being
passing to the limit. But this doesn’t stop here.
Here, we are at a really extremely delicate and
complicated point. But here, we can also say that
the dying will inevitably lead to death, of course.
Toward nothing, from which no one will return,
there is nothing to repeat, there is no sense, etc. At
the same time, this is something that we could find
in Heidegger, and then afterward Heidegger turned
away from this quite differently, but what we can
work out differently is that death is the possibility
of the impossible. But the impossible doesn't mean
that we can't arrive, achieve. It means what's
outside of possibility. There is no question of the
possible. Well then, this also means that death is
two things—or instead we can describe it using life
as Derrida tries to do by talking about Life-Death in
a single phrase. But if, indeed, I cannot think of
21. 20
syntagmes. Mais si, en effet, je ne peux penser la
mort dans la vie—ce qui en effet un peu le mourir
de Blanchot. Mais, ça veut dire que si je ne peux
pas penser que la fin de ma vie est bien, en même
temps, ce qui achève quelques choses parce que
sinon rien ne serait jamais achevé. Qu'est ce que ça
voudrait dire ne pas mourir?
death in life—which is effectively Blanchot's
concept of dying [le mourir]. But, that is to say that
if I can't think that the end of my life is good and, at
the same time, with some things
achieved/completed a few things. Otherwise,
nothing would ever be completed. What would it
mean not to die?
Athena
C'est que ça, ça devient—il n'y a plus un sens.
2.19 Athena
There would no longer be meaning.
Jean-Luc Nancy
Non, exactement. Au contraire, comme vous dise, si
on ne meurt pas, il n'y a plus de sens. Et alors, ça
veut dire aussi que c'est dans la mort qu'il y a le
sens—c'est à dire, le sens de ceci que le sens n'est
jamais complet/achevé et que le sens il est
justement d'aller jusqu'au bout du possible et puis
d'entrer dans l’impossible. Récemment, j'ai lu une
phrase très, très bien, très belle de Badiou dans le
petit livre qu'il a publié sur son fils qui est mort,
Olivier, et alors Badiou il dit que Olivier est mort à
25 ans et quand quelqu'un meurt à cet âge là, on dit
que c'est une vie inachevée. Mais, dit Badiou,
inachevée ça suppose qu'on a une idée de ce que
serait l'achèvement qui n'a pas de sens. Est-ce que la
vie est inachevée à 5 ans, à 25 ans, à 95 ans…?
2.20 Jean-Luc Nancy
No, exactly. On the contrary, as you stated, if we
don't die, there is no sense. This also means that it is
in death that there is meaning—that is, the meaning
of this that meaning is never complete/completed
and the meaning is precisely to go to the end of the
possible and to then enter the impossible. Recently,
I read a very, very beautiful sentence from Badiou
in the little book he published about his son,
Olivier, who is dead; he says that Olivier died at 25
years old and when someone dies at this age, we
call it an unfinished [inachevée] life. But, says
Badiou, calling it unfinished assumes that there is
an idea of what completion would be, which makes
no sense. Is life unfinished at 5 years, 25, at 95…?
Athena
On ne peut jamais le dire, fin, on ne peut jamais le
savoir.
2.21 Athena
We can never tell, well, we can never know.
Jean-Luc Nancy
Enfin bon voila. L'a propos—seulement pour
resserrer là autour de La communauté désavouée.
2.22 Jean-Luc Nancy
Well good, voilà. That's what I have to say about
it—only to tighten the space around The Disavowed
Community.
22. 21
L’amour en éclats vs. “La Communauté des Amants”
Love in “La communauté désoeuvrée”
In The Inoperative Community, Nancy takes on the question of finite relation as an
inherent condition of community. By virtue of this, he moves on to form an ontological
description of community as follows: “So Being itself comes to be defined as relational, as
non-absoluteness, and if you will [...] as community” (Nancy 1991a, 6). Toward the end of
Inoperative, Nancy responds to Bataille’s—and, by extension, Blanchot’s —explanation of24
what he calls “the community of lovers.” When this is brought into the concluding pages of the
essay, Nancy notes that the lovers experience an “ “unleashing of passions,” [that is,] the sharing
of singular beings” which bursts forth parallel to the community’s emergence. This is a
communication, a sharing, an exposure of finitude (Nancy 1991a, 35). This sharing comes to be
called a “passing to [the] limit” in which “finitude passes "from" the one "to" the other” (Nancy
1991a, 35). In other words, the community of lovers is constituted by the lovers’ mutual sharing
with one another and, consequently, their corresponding yet singular experiences of that which
limits (and is, in fact, the limit of) such a communication: their finitude.
Nancy notes that the fundamental exposition which triggers a community of lovers, as
well as a community in general, “is always incomplete” by dint of this common finitude (Nancy
1991a, 35). Soon after, he takes to a more explicit description of the community of lovers as a
state of finite exposure, not only “between themselves,” but also to an outside:
The acknowledged limit of love is [...] the sharing of community precisely inasmuch as the
individual also passes through love, and precisely because he exposes himself to it. Love does not
complete community [...]: in that case it would be its work, or it would put it to work. On the
24
Seeing as Blanchot titles the second and concluding half of The Unavowable Community after Bataille’s phrase,
“The Community of Lovers.”
23. 22
contrary, love [...] exposes the unworking and therefore the incessant incompletion of community.
It exposes community at its limit. (Nancy 1991a, 38)
Thus, the community of lovers as Nancy describes it, happens through and in this quality of
insufficiency. Humans are finite, only existing in relation by way of this insufficiency. Nancy
makes it clear—in that we are defined by our inherent insufficiency as finite beings—that
phenomena such as relation, sharing, exposure, community, and love are, too, insufficient by
definition. Thus, in explicitly ascribing these phenomena as necessarily insufficient, Nancy aims
to note the way in which love “cuts or marks the heart, inaugurating the becoming of the singular
being. That is, it is through affectionate and passionate relations with the other – through
plurality – that singularity is constituted” (Secomb 2007, 142).
L’amour en éclats
Jean-Luc Nancy did not spend very much time responding to Bataille or Blanchot’s
notions of love in The Inoperative Community. That being said, he did put forth a slew of pieces
with similar or related themes during those fifteen years. Notable of these is his essay L’amour
en éclats (Shattered Love), which was first published in Aléa n°7 in May of 1986 and later25
published within his book Une pensée finie in 1990 . In Shattered Love, Jean-Luc Nancy26
demonstrates love as transient, so much so that it evades definition. Further, he describes love as
provoked by a mutual exposure (that is, two people being exposed to one another), causing it
25
Taken from the Notes chapter of The Inoperative Community is a remark from the translators of Shattered Love on the title:
“Note: The title of the French text is “L'amour en éclats.” The word éclat should be read in all its outbursts. The word can mean,
and appears here as, shatter, piece, splinter, glimmer, flash, spark, burst, outburst, explosion, brilliance, dazzle, and splendor.
—Trans.” (163)
26
While L’amour en éclats was not published in the French iteration of The Inoperative Community, it appears as
the fourth chapter in the English one. I presume this may be because Shattered Love had not yet been
written/published by the time Désoeuvrée was in March of 1986. However, it appeared in print just two months later
in May and is very clearly entwined with his conception of a community. Moreover, much like how Blanchot’s book
presents it—concerning not only community, but also love as community—Nancy’s book, in its English form, does
so as well.
24. 23
(love) to traverse each lover, singularly. In The Inoperative Community’s foreword, Christopher
Fynsk elaborates on this “traversal”:
[Love] comes upon the self and draws the self forth, prompting the self to offer its love to
the other (its being-exposed); but as further exposure this love that departs comes back to
the self, only to renew its transport. It is a traversal that constantly remarks its passage as
passage but without ever presenting itself [...]. An advent that withholds itself by the
return of its very advent, exposing us to our exposure, and further exposure, but never
secure in its very return, never returning to the self (as in the investments of narcissism),
and never a possession. (Fynsk 1991, xviii)
Thus, Nancy defines love not by what it is, because it is not; rather, love is the transient breach
(éclat) of the lover's self, exposing them to their own incompleteness—that is, the finite bounds
which render them unable to grasp that which traverses them in love. This breach cannot be
undone, Nancy contends . Once this singular experience of love—of myself as27
incomplete—traverses us, all we have left is the promise of love—not to be confused with a
certainty of love. Instead, it is the impossibility of this certainty that pushes the lover to say this
promise again and again.
La communauté des amants
Blanchot takes to relationality and its effect on pairs of lovers, among other forms of
intimacy, in The Unavowable Community. Throughout this piece, Blanchot touches on topics of
love, its expression, its nature, and its triumph. Notably, he explains that love, when experienced,
is imbued with the subtle, yet towering sense that it is “always under the prior threat of
disappearance” (25). Illustrated in this way, this understanding may sound foreign to many. And
27
As he states in Shattered Love: “From then on, I is constituted broken. As soon as there is love, the slightest act of
love, the slightest spark, there is this ontological fissure that cuts across and that disconnects the elements of the
subject-proper—the fibers of its heart. [...] The love break simply means this: that I can no longer, whatever
presence to myself I may maintain or that sustains me, pro-pose myself to myself (nor im-pose myself on another)
without remains, without something of me remaining, outside of me.” (Nancy 1991b, 96-97)
25. 24
yet, it stands as a fundamental element of the finite human’s experience . In The Unavowable28
Community, Blanchot explains love as synonymous with—that is to say, a manifestation
of—what he calls “the community of lovers.” Further, he articulates this polynomial concept29
within the realm of an intimate relationship: “[...] two beings try to unite only to live (and in a
certain way to celebrate) the failure that constitutes the truth of what would be their perfect
union, the lie of that union which always takes place by not taking place.” He then proceeds to
ask the question, “Do they, in spite of all that, form some kind of community?” only to sustain
that “It is rather because of that [and not in spite of it] that they form a community” (Blanchot
49). In this description, Blanchot refers to the perfect, the ideal, union which the lovers may seek
in their coming together. Nonetheless, he argues, this idea of a “perfect union” is only constituted
by its prior failure--that is to say that, despite our efforts to experience/embody this union, there
is no such thing. In an effort to emphatically reiterate this idea, he proceeds to deem this ideal
union a “lie” since the experience (of what may only be a semblance or image of this “perfect
union”) is made possible because it is impossible. He then calls us to question if these lovers, in
defiance of their perfect union’s impossibility, foment their experience of community. Blanchot
concludes that this experience is not “in spite of” this impossibility; but, instead, that it is this
impossibility that constitutes a possibility for community. Moreover, this is why Blanchot often
refers to (the) community (of lovers) as the negative, or unavowable, community, since it is only
possible through its impossibility and is thereby impossible to certifiably avow or name as
28
Let’s take to a simpler, more common, example of this to understand what Blanchot asserts here: Imagine watching your
favorite music artist play your favorite song live. You feel the bassline vibrate through your bones and, soon enough,
goosebumps wash over your skin. You stand there, listening intently, wishing this song would never come to a close. You wish
they would keep playing it, over and over and over, so that you may continue to cherish this feeling forever. However, no matter
how strongly you wish for this, the song will have to end and, consequently, that feeling will end, too. If it didn’t, the singer’s
voice would soon grow coarse, the band might start making mistakes, or you’d have to return home and go on with your life in
compliance with your obligations. Thus, every moment we experience — whether we are entranced by it in this way or not — is
fleeting. Therefore, every moment is “always under the prior threat of disappearance.”
29
Referred to as The Negative Community; Love; Atopos; The Unavowable Community; etc.
26. 25
manifest, but rather is only experienced.
Within the second part of The Unavowable Community, entitled “The Community of
Lovers,” Blanchot displays the negative community by virtue of love’s inherent essence of
atopos. The term atopos may not often be used by Blanchot; however, its definition remains
compatible with his theory of the negative community. Atopic love, in this regard, represents an
intimate relationship between two people, played out within the same schema used to explain the
impossible possibility of the negative community. Moreover, the atopic lovers, by definition,
remain in a state of solitude and are dispossessed of any traditional relationship structures (i.e.
monogamy and/or marriage). And yet, they are left with an impossible, yet possible chance for
intimacy in their shared solitude: “[...] How not to search that space where, for a time span
lasting from dusk to dawn, two beings have no other reason to exist than to expose themselves
totally to each other [...] so that their common solitude may appear not in front of their own eyes
but in front of ours, yes, how not to look there and how not to rediscover 'the negative
community, the community of those who have no community’?” (Blanchot 49-50).
ἔρος ατοπος : A Two-Sided Take on Socrates’& Alcibiades’Love
Whilst the Symposium chronicles 7 prominent Athenians giving speeches describing their
rendition of the meaning of ἔρος (eros), it also provides the reader with a story of unrequited
love between Alcibiades, an Athenian statesman/general, and Socrates. Through both Nancy’s
and Blanchot’s respective thoughts on love as community, we may be able to extract something
new from the Symposium. To clarify, this is not an attempt toward defining Plato’s assertions
about ἔρος within the Symposium, but rather an attempt to look back in time to the first
philosophical thinking of love to find none other than what both Nancy and Blanchot have
27. 26
described love to be: a destabilizing, corporeal transcendance I would like to call ἔρος ατοπος
(atopic love). While it is clear that Jean-Luc Nancy and Maurice Blanchot make use of different
lexiconal approaches--Nancy’s more Heideggerian-ontological style vs. Blanchot’s
Levinasian-ethical style--the two are in accord about what they are signaling, that love traverses
us each, singularly, and leaves us transcendently exposed to our finitude.
Socrates’ speech regards ἔρος—not as a god, but as an intermediary spirit between the
godly (infinite) and the human (finite) realms—whose interest is to guide the lover upward along
the “ladder of love,” toward love for the Form of Beauty itself, not physical manifestations of it.
This is said to lead the lover to a greater, incorporeal wisdom, articulated as knowledge
(ἐπιστήμη - epistēmē). Alcibiades, too, discusses love, but in place of speaking of ἔρος, he
chooses to recount his personal experience of loving Socrates, who does not love him back. In its
personal, wine-soaked account of love as corporeal and atopic, Alcibiades' speech brings to light
a form of love which is not often acknowledged as such, but remains vital to our thinking of love
today.
Alcibiades joins the symposium just after the final speech, given by Socrates, has come to
a close. Soon after he belligerently enters, the two exchange dramatic words, with Alcibiades
saying to Socrates “You’ve trapped me again! You always do this to me [...] ” and Socrates
telling the other symposiasts that, due to Alcibiades’ emotional intensity, he worries for his own
safety: “The fierceness of his passion terrifies me!” (Nehemas 1989, 62, 213d). Soon after this,
Alcibiades is invited to give a speech of his own in regard to ἔρος; he is moved to give a speech
with the aim of exposing both Socrates’ truth and his own through an explicitly truthful account
of their short time together.
28. 27
Alcibiades begins his account of ἔρος with the declaration that, despite Socrates’
inevitable reproach, his speech will be in ‘praise’ of Socrates and will be the “truth”. Alcibiades
notes how “something much more painful than a snake has bitten me in my most sensitive
part—I mean my heart, or my soul, or whatever you want to call it, which has been struck and
bitten by philosophy, whose grip on young and eager souls is much more vicious than a viper’s
and makes them do the most amazing things” (Nehemas 1989, 69, 218a) . Alcibiades, as30
opposed to Socrates who so explicitly pushes for a form of knowledge that is both individual and
devoid of physical experience, notes a form of knowledge here that is reached through emotion.
He describes such emotions with verbs of touch (such as “bitten”: “δηχθείη”) and ultimately
refers to this experience as one of learning through suffering. This is noted in the final line of
Alcibiades’ speech, when he says: “παθόντα γνῶναι,” which directly translates to “to
perceive/learn (γνῶναι), having suffered (παθόντα).”
Subsequently, he explains, using vivid imagery, the experience of the erotic “traversal”
noted by Nancy. Alcibiades comically compares Socrates to the image of a Silenus statue — a31
(horse-, not goat-) satyr statue which is hollow and broken down the middle, so as to reveal the
many tiny, intricate statues of the gods perched within —, insinuating that, much like this statue,
there is something of a treasure hidden within Socrates waiting to be revealed. Alcibiades
describes an instance when he encounters the treasure of Socrates: “But I once caught him when
he was open like Silenus’ statues, and I had a glimpse of the figures he [217A] keeps hidden
within: they were so godlike—so bright and beautiful, so utterly amazing—that I no longer had a
30
“ἐγὼ οὖν δεδηγμένος τε ὑπὸ ἀλγεινοτέρου καὶ τὸ ἀλγεινότατον ὧν ἄν τις δηχθείη—τὴν καρδίαν γὰρ ἢ ψυχὴν ἢ
ὅτι δεῖ αὐτὸ ὀνομάσαι πληγείς τε καὶ δηχθεὶς ὑπὸ τῶν ἐν φιλοσοφίᾳ λόγων” (Perseus, Symposium, 218a)
31
Alcibiades describes the statue as such: “It’s a Silenus sitting, his flute or his pipes in his hands, and it’s hollow.
It’s split right down the middle, and inside it’s full of tiny statues of the gods” (Symposium 65).
29. 28
choice—I just had to do whatever he told me” (Nehemas 1989, 68, 217a). Alcibiades, here, notes
his own view of Socrates as godlike, as affecting him profoundly. Something which admittedly
scares Socrates, Alcibiades has felt something that no one else noted in their speech--he feels
love, in its corporeal form.
This love is imperfect, as it is human-bound (and in accord with Socrates’ own speech),
yet completing in its incompleteness. He is destabilized by it, broken by it. Just as “Nancy writes
in ‘Shattered Love’: ‘he, this subject, was touched, broken into, in his subjectivity, and he is
from then on, from the time of love, opened by this slice, broken or fractured, even if only
slightly . . . From then on, I is con- stituted broken’ (ibid.: 261)” (Secomb 2007, 145). He
embraces what Nussbaum refers to as an instinct toward revealing the treasures hidden within the
particular world and/or human being, thus fusing the innate appetitive desire with the
epistemological desire. This brings to light a critique of Socrates-Diotima's disembodied love,
albeit maintaining that it is a valid understanding of love as a predecessor to knowledge, while
also revealing it as a display of unease and thus an attempt for an antidote to the grandiose risk of
being affected by an Other (as the embodied lover allows). Then begs the question, what makes
this risk worth enduring? In Blanchot's The Unavowable Community, his concept of the
"community of lovers" bears an inherent element of loss/lack, consistent with Alcibiades'
experience of love as atopos.
33. 32
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