Deconstruction - Derrida: (Transitions)

Deconstruction*Derrida contests the notion that what Jacques Derrida does can be turned into a theory for literary interpretation. It also questions the idea that there is a critical methodology called deconstruction which can be applied to literary texts in a programmatic fashion. In this introductory study to the work of Jacques Derrida, Julian Wolfreys introduces the reader to a range of Derrida's interests and concerns, while offering readings, informed by Derrida's thought, of canonical and less well-known literary works.

Table of Contents:
Series Preface Abbreviations Acknowledgements Introduction PART 1: THE MAKE-BELIEVE OF A BEGINNING Another Introduction/Entamer Preparatory to Anything Else: Derrida's Interests PART 2: PREPARATORY TO ANYTHING ELSE: SINGULAR EXAMPLES OR, IDENTITY, SPECTRALITY, UNDECIDABILITY Writing (of) Identities: Facing up to Derrida or, the example of Paul Valery The Hauntological Example: the City as the Haunt of Writing in the Texts of Iain Sinclair Heart? of Darkness? Reading in the Dark with J.Hillis Miller and Joseph Conrad PART 3: SOME SUPPLEMENTARY AFTERWORD Afterword(s): Contrary to the 'Logic of the Heading' Annotated Bibliography Bibliography Index.

About the Author :
JULIAN WOLFREYS is Associate Professor in the Department of English, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville. He is the author of Being English: Narratives, Idioms and Performances of National Identity from Coleridge to Trollope and The Rhetoric of Affirmative Resistances: Dissonant Identities from Carroll to Derrida (also published by Macmillan). He has recently completed a study of representations of London. JULIAN WOLFREYS is Associate Professor in the Department of English, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville. He is the author of Being English: Narratives, Idioms and Performances of National Identity from Coleridge to Trollope and The Rhetoric of Affirmative Resistances: Dissonant Identities from Carroll to Derrida (also published by Macmillan). He has recently completed a study of representations of London.

Review :
'If theory now faces the insistent option 'Lacan or Derrida?', Julian Wolfreys has chosen decisively - and persuasively - to go with Derrida, and has written an introduction to his writing which is supple, detailed, instructive and very intelligent.' - Antony Easthope, Manchester Metropolitan University 'It is not enough to say that there is no book on Derrida so sharp or so accessible as Wolfreys' sly and powerful work; this is also the most provocative discussion of the place and potential of deconstruction in our work I know of. Wolfreys has managed not simply to get Derrida right - well, to get him wrong knowingly and tellingly, as he says - but to get him before us in a way as to allow us to release for ourselves the enormous energy of this way of thinking and doing. This is Derrida on the move, on the make. Wolfreys has managed to so get inside Derrida and the deconstructive world that he writes with an ease and absolute lucidity that makes the play open and participatory, easily available to us all. Play that can do so much is the most serious activity imaginable, and this book that can do so much for students and scholars and do it with such apparent ease and such generous wit could not possibly be more welcome. It is the Derrida for our time.' - James R. Kincaid, University of Southern California 'Though talking about Derrida precludes anything purporting to be a beginner's guide, this book manages to discuss his ideas and theories in a way that makes trying to tackle them that bit easier. Wolfreys has a playful style, he knows the damage deconstruction can do to thought if it is handled in the wrong way and this helps to both show that fact to the reader and make it easier to absorb. Though it stands alone brilliantly it is perhaps best as a supplement to all the other confusing works. No book makes Derrida easy, but with this in hand it all seems more approachable. The best book on the subject.' - Dan Roddy , Nottingham 'A lively book which, while insisting that there is no such thing as deconstruction, manages to tell us quite a lot about it and a great deal about the work of Jacques Derrida. Readers will find the annotated bibliography especially useful.' - Jonathan Culler, Cornell University