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aim of this paper will be to show that since the modern works I am meant to be discussing challenge the very possibility of maintaining the discreteness of theoretical exposition and literary reading, it would only be by ignoring the claims of the theory I am discussing, that I can fulfil or avoid sending back my remit. This conclusion opaque, perhaps, at present will be approached gradually by a discussion of some aspects of exemplification. And since I will need to approach exemplary material in modern and ancient texts, the self-reflexivity of this discussion is evident, inevitable and difficult. Indeed, since I have begun with some theoretical questions and will end with some comments on Homer and tragedy, I might seem finally to have reproduced something at least of the editors' requirements, even as I claim to be refusing them. (Such worrying about the self-reflexive lures of writing is often taken as an exemplary sign of post-structuralist criticism the endless suspicion of another question?) It is worth stating from the outset, however, that my questions about exemplification are not broached because I think criticism can do without the exemplary, but because this necessary aspect of criticism is all too rarely considered. |
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Moreover, the difficulty of giving a theoretical exposition of Derrida's work (followed or supported by exemplary demonstrations) is in itself a topos of writing about Derrida and post-structuralism. Rudolph Gasché writes of literary criticism's adoption of Derridean strategies that the 'reduction [of Derrida's debate with philosophy] to a few sturdy devices for the critic's use represents nothing less than an extraordinary blurring and toning-down of the critical implication of this philosopher's work'.8 Or books like Christopher Norris' Deconstruction: theory and practice offer sly or self-defensive or despairing gestures of apology: 'What follows is . . .a deferred involvement with the writings of Derrida, and not to be taken on trust as a handy or "objective" survey of deconstructionist method. If there is one applied lesson to be taken away, it is the powerlessness of ready-made concepts to explain or delimit the activity of writing'.9 Or, from Derek Attridge, 'the raîson d'être of the present volume . . .is unmistakably at odds with Derrida's own thinking'.10 I too . . .by quoting such (exemplary) remarks manipulate in turn the protocols of recusatio as I hesitate before my editors' request to list 'the sturdy devices' for 'the interested neophyte'.11 |
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8 Gasché (1979) 180; see also Gasché (1986). |
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9 Norris (1982) xiii. |
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10 Attridge (1992) 7. A good discussion of the problem is also to be found in Ulmer (1985). |
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11 While listing these useful introductions: Harrari (1979); Young (1981); Norris (1982); Culler (1983); Ulmer (1985); Spivak's introduction to Derrida (1976), and Derrida's own attempt, Derrida (1981). 'The interested neophyte' is the editors' intended audience. |
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