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Zapalam światło w ciemnym pokoju: oświetlony pokój z pewnością nie jest już ciemnym pokojem, utraciłem go na zawsze.
To, czego mieć już nie mogę, co nieskończenie wymyka się wstecz, a zarazem wypycha mnie naprzód, jest już jedynie przedstawieniem języka, ciemnością zakładaną dla światła.
Światło jest tylko dojściem ciemności do samej siebie.
To, czego mieć już nie mogę, co nieskończenie wymyka się wstecz, a zarazem wypycha mnie naprzód, jest już jedynie przedstawieniem języka, ciemnością zakładaną dla światła.
Światło jest tylko dojściem ciemności do samej siebie.
204 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1985
About the author
Giorgio Agamben
229 books872 followersGiorgio Agamben is one of the leading figures in Italian and contemporary continental philosophy. He is the author of Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life; Remnants of Auschwitz: The Witness and the Archive; Profanations; The Signature of All Things: On Method, and other books. Through the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s he treated a wide range of topics, including aesthetics, literature, language, ontology, nihilism, and radical political thought.
In recent years, his work has had a deep impact on contemporary scholarship in a number of disciplines in the Anglo-American intellectual world. Born in Rome in 1942, Agamben completed studies in Law and Philosophy with a doctoral thesis on the political thought of Simone Weil, and participated in Martin Heidegger’s seminars on Hegel and Heraclitus as a postdoctoral scholar.
He rose to international prominence after the publication of Homo Sacer in 1995. Translated into English in 1998, the book’s analyses of law, life, and state power appeared uncannily prescient after the attacks on New York City and Washington, DC in September 2001, and the resultant shifts in the geopolitical landscape. Provoking a wave of scholarly interest in the philosopher’s work, the book also marked the beginning of a 20-year research project, which represents Agamben’s most important contribution to political philosophy.
In recent years, his work has had a deep impact on contemporary scholarship in a number of disciplines in the Anglo-American intellectual world. Born in Rome in 1942, Agamben completed studies in Law and Philosophy with a doctoral thesis on the political thought of Simone Weil, and participated in Martin Heidegger’s seminars on Hegel and Heraclitus as a postdoctoral scholar.
He rose to international prominence after the publication of Homo Sacer in 1995. Translated into English in 1998, the book’s analyses of law, life, and state power appeared uncannily prescient after the attacks on New York City and Washington, DC in September 2001, and the resultant shifts in the geopolitical landscape. Provoking a wave of scholarly interest in the philosopher’s work, the book also marked the beginning of a 20-year research project, which represents Agamben’s most important contribution to political philosophy.
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
June 15, 2021
I Yield to Incomprehension
Poetry is a remedy for the temptation to reify words as things other than words. This is why it can be difficult. The urge to make words into things that are not words is powerful. We become frustrated when that urge is inhibited. We try to interpret poetry as we typically interpret prose, as literal descriptions of things outside of language. The result is ideology, dogmatic religion, and endless family quarrels. But poetry won’t allow these things. Poetry insists that words are things that only have relationships with other words. It shows that killing for, believing in, and using words to describe ‘what just happened,’ is a mug’s game.
So where does that leave prose? Is prose just an open sham, a visible but unacknowledged scandal? Do we cynically employ it ‘as if’ it had definite connections to things outside of language? Poetry gone bad? Or are we just ignorant about the character of language and exploit it when we need in order to get and keep power. These are the questions we are led to by modern epistemology - not which words better represent ‘reality’ but the ethics of using words at all.
This applies to philosophical prose most acutely. When philosophers talk about things like ontology and teleology and existence, are these terms any less poetic than theologians gossip about original sin, judgement and salvation? Or for that matter, are scientific references to gravity, quarks and black holes as prosaically ‘unattached’ as the vocabulary of philosophers and theologians? Could it be that science is in some obscure way just better poetry?
The implication of Agamben’s discursive remarks (Poetry? Prose? Something halfway between the two?) is that if thought (the domain of prose) is to say anything meaningful at all it must be “incited” to do so along with the imaginative daring of words that refer explicitly only to other words (the domain of poetry). Neither prose nor poetry alone is adequate to communicate about reality. The Idea of Prose explores that interaction by reference to the most well known 20th century European philosophers, interpreting and re-interpreting them with elegance and erudition.
I don’t claim to understand Agamben’s argument, or even his thesis. It is beyond my intellectual abilities to comprehend how the interaction of poetry and prose gets us beyond the 20 volumes of The Oxford English Dictionary (or the considerably shorter Garzantia Linguistitca) and into something approaching reality. The suggestion appeals to me but I can’t grasp the reasoning. Perhaps that is not his intention at all. If there is anyone out there in GR land who has a suggestion about where to plant my ignorance, I would welcome advice.
Poetry is a remedy for the temptation to reify words as things other than words. This is why it can be difficult. The urge to make words into things that are not words is powerful. We become frustrated when that urge is inhibited. We try to interpret poetry as we typically interpret prose, as literal descriptions of things outside of language. The result is ideology, dogmatic religion, and endless family quarrels. But poetry won’t allow these things. Poetry insists that words are things that only have relationships with other words. It shows that killing for, believing in, and using words to describe ‘what just happened,’ is a mug’s game.
So where does that leave prose? Is prose just an open sham, a visible but unacknowledged scandal? Do we cynically employ it ‘as if’ it had definite connections to things outside of language? Poetry gone bad? Or are we just ignorant about the character of language and exploit it when we need in order to get and keep power. These are the questions we are led to by modern epistemology - not which words better represent ‘reality’ but the ethics of using words at all.
This applies to philosophical prose most acutely. When philosophers talk about things like ontology and teleology and existence, are these terms any less poetic than theologians gossip about original sin, judgement and salvation? Or for that matter, are scientific references to gravity, quarks and black holes as prosaically ‘unattached’ as the vocabulary of philosophers and theologians? Could it be that science is in some obscure way just better poetry?
The implication of Agamben’s discursive remarks (Poetry? Prose? Something halfway between the two?) is that if thought (the domain of prose) is to say anything meaningful at all it must be “incited” to do so along with the imaginative daring of words that refer explicitly only to other words (the domain of poetry). Neither prose nor poetry alone is adequate to communicate about reality. The Idea of Prose explores that interaction by reference to the most well known 20th century European philosophers, interpreting and re-interpreting them with elegance and erudition.
I don’t claim to understand Agamben’s argument, or even his thesis. It is beyond my intellectual abilities to comprehend how the interaction of poetry and prose gets us beyond the 20 volumes of The Oxford English Dictionary (or the considerably shorter Garzantia Linguistitca) and into something approaching reality. The suggestion appeals to me but I can’t grasp the reasoning. Perhaps that is not his intention at all. If there is anyone out there in GR land who has a suggestion about where to plant my ignorance, I would welcome advice.
September 10, 2023
Jedna strona trawiona jak najlepszy literacki posiłek, w emfazie zachodzących akwafort, przychodzących myśli i odchodzących słów. Takie książki jak ta smakuje tylko kochać i kocha się tylko smakując. ("Tak bardzo obecne i intymne, że w żadnym wypadku nie daje się wspominać").
February 10, 2020
Floripondio heideggeriano sobre temas importantes. La forma del ensayo breve, pulido, saturado de erudición se presta para compartir ideas luminosas mezcladas con monadas de organillero. El monito baila, pasa la gorra. Cuando el espectáculo aburre, justo en ese momento, el relámpago de lucidez, el organillero sorprende. Desde las entrañas de textos griegos o latinos, Agamben recupera tesoros escondidos. Aunque algunos no tanto. Se viene también un poco más acá, sobre todo hasta Kafka, que aparece como un antiguo congelado que se despertó en la modernidad. Tres ideas interesantes en este libro, tres por lo menos. Una, la relación entre el comunismo y la pornografía en la gestión de ese resto del deseo, la búsqueda de felicidad. Otra, la relación entre prosa y poesía, a la manera vaporosa de Agamben, quizás el aporte más flojo del libro. La última, Kafka. Para Agamben, Kafka es un sismógrafo de lo que la modernidad ha destrozado. Tierra arrasada. Queda sólo el yo, esa miseria psicoanalítica. Más todavía, como el yo estaría hecho también de partes que procesan lo externo, tampoco quedaría esa ficción yoica disponible en tales aspectos. De ahí que el Kafka de Agamben es un héroe que busca devolverle algo al hombre moderno algo de su yo por la vía de la vergüenza. Que no es antigua, dice Agamben. Todo esto suena muy chispeante, pero habría que estudiarlo. Me parece que sí había vergüenza en el hombre antiguo. Estaba el destierro, por ejemplo. Deshonor y vergüenza. ¿Entonces? Bueno, así es el ensayo. Está permitido compartir ocurrencias, impresiones, sospechas, con tal que esté bien escrito. Pero no son afirmaciones, son proto-hipótesis. Importa más bien el estilo. Agamben tiene un estilo brillante, no sólo por la erudición, sino por el movimiento, la estrategia. Pone un título al ensayo y se pone de inmediato a hablar de otra cosa, cuanto más lejana -en apariencia-, mejor. Sólo en las líneas finales del micro-ensayo hace la conexión. Ocurre así el placer del insight lector. El remate, la puncta latina, la pointe francesa. Magia erudita.
August 27, 2017
Sade 'muamma fikri' için bile dört yıldız verirdim:
"Muammanın en belirgin özelliği, kışkırttığı gizemin yarattığı beklentinin istisnasız her durumda hayal kırıklığıyla el ele gitmesidir; çünkü çözüm tam da, orada sadece muammanın görüntüsü olduğunu göstermekten ibarettir..."
"Muammanın en belirgin özelliği, kışkırttığı gizemin yarattığı beklentinin istisnasız her durumda hayal kırıklığıyla el ele gitmesidir; çünkü çözüm tam da, orada sadece muammanın görüntüsü olduğunu göstermekten ibarettir..."
March 13, 2024
Heel delicaat..
Mijn hart klopt als een verrotte kies wanneer ik Agamben lees. What a mind.
Ik vermoed dat enkel Heideggers colleges over de grondstemming van de verveling ooit geresoneerd hebben zoals Agambens woorden dat doen.
Ik zou dit werk alleen aanraden aan een poëtische filosoof, en wie is er moedig (en dwaas) genoeg om die titel tot zich te nemen?
Mijn hart klopt als een verrotte kies wanneer ik Agamben lees. What a mind.
Ik vermoed dat enkel Heideggers colleges over de grondstemming van de verveling ooit geresoneerd hebben zoals Agambens woorden dat doen.
Ik zou dit werk alleen aanraden aan een poëtische filosoof, en wie is er moedig (en dwaas) genoeg om die titel tot zich te nemen?
April 1, 2022
Lucidez y belleza
May 27, 2013
"solo la parola ci mette in contatto con le cose mute. mentre la natura e gli animali sono già presi in una lingua e, pur tacendo, incessantemente parlano e rispondono a segni, solo l'uomo riesce a interrompere, nella parola, la lingua infinita della natura e a porsi per un attimo di fronte alle mute cose. solo per l'uomo esiste la rosa indelibata, l'idea della rosa"
(splendido)
(splendido)
March 10, 2024
Certaines Idées sont transcendantes
May 7, 2024
Es un popurrí. Favs: idea del estudio (fragmentos bonitos sobre la tristeza del estudioso), idea del poder (el dolor de la potencia que se desvanece) idea del comunismo (encontré una cita que buscaba hace tiempo, esa mítica sobre aprehender las estrellas y el comunismo).
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 8, 2017
"Svegliandoci, sappiamo, a volte, di aver veduto in sogno la verità con tanta palpabile chiarezza, da esserne perfettamente appagati. Ci viene, una volta, mostrata una scrittura che dissigilla a un tratto il segreto della nostra esistenza; altre volte, una sola parola, accompagnata da un gesto imperioso o ripetuta in una cantilena puerile, candisce in una luce di lampo un intero paesaggio di ombre, consegnando ogni dettaglio alla sua ritrovata e definitiva fattezza.
Al risveglio, tuttavia, pur ricordando noi limpidamente tutte le immagini del sogno, quella scrittura e quella parola hanno perduto la loro forza veritativa e, con tristezza, le rivoltiamo, sfatate, da ogni parte, senza più riuscire a raccapezzarne il portento. Abbiamo il sogno, ma, di esso, inspiegabilmente ci manca l’essenziale, che è rimasto sepolto in quella terra dove, dèsti, non abbiamo più accesso." (p. 47)
Al risveglio, tuttavia, pur ricordando noi limpidamente tutte le immagini del sogno, quella scrittura e quella parola hanno perduto la loro forza veritativa e, con tristezza, le rivoltiamo, sfatate, da ogni parte, senza più riuscire a raccapezzarne il portento. Abbiamo il sogno, ma, di esso, inspiegabilmente ci manca l’essenziale, che è rimasto sepolto in quella terra dove, dèsti, non abbiamo più accesso." (p. 47)
January 30, 2013
Petit livre facile à lire qui lu de plusieurs manières. Je pense que si j'étais professeur(e) de philosophie, je partirai de ce livre que je ferais lire à mes étudiants. Il est autant agréable à lire en tant que recueil de petits textes de philosophie générale ou encore comme amorce ou référence à un moment de l'histoire de la philosophie.
A retenir de ce livre, le constat de l'auteur qu'il n'y a plus de phénoménologie contemporaine, c'est-à-dire, des récits sur des expériences du monde contemporaines. Et cela malgré l'abondance de concepts.
Par cet exercice de philosophie sous forme de prose, l'auteur nous invite à vivre des expériences (plutôt que de s'accrocher à des théories) et à explorer ainsi la phénoménologie contemporaine.
A retenir de ce livre, le constat de l'auteur qu'il n'y a plus de phénoménologie contemporaine, c'est-à-dire, des récits sur des expériences du monde contemporaines. Et cela malgré l'abondance de concepts.
Par cet exercice de philosophie sous forme de prose, l'auteur nous invite à vivre des expériences (plutôt que de s'accrocher à des théories) et à explorer ainsi la phénoménologie contemporaine.
September 22, 2020
Poesia inscrita em ideias filosóficas, com referências extensas em linhas breves.
A minha favorita é "Ideia da morte", mas muitas foram as vezes em que precisei pausar a leitura e meditar as palavras e as imagens. Isso é o que eu mais valorizo em qualquer livro (principalmente os de filosofia e poesia).
A minha favorita é "Ideia da morte", mas muitas foram as vezes em que precisei pausar a leitura e meditar as palavras e as imagens. Isso é o que eu mais valorizo em qualquer livro (principalmente os de filosofia e poesia).
June 20, 2018
Assez agréable à lire et intéressant, ce recueil de cours textes philosophiques ou analytique présente des réflexions de l'auteurs sur des sujets assez divers se rapportant en général à l'écriture, au texte et au mot. Je n'en garde pas un souvenir fou mais c'était sympa.
May 10, 2014
Agamben'in her satırında Walter Benjamin'in izleri var. "Belli bir kadere inanan kişi tam anlamıyla konuşamaz." Çok esinleyici bir kitap.
December 28, 2015
Fascinating episodic ideas. As it was the inspiration to Blixa Bargelds song "Axolotl", I liked "The Idea of Infancy" the most.
October 4, 2017
De a ratos rebuscado, con más frecuencia genuinamente poético, y siempre inesperado.
July 7, 2021
Este libro es principalmente para los conocedores de la obra de Agamben. En este, él retoma muchos de los temas de sus otros libros con breves lecturas nuevas en relación con la prosa y la diversidad de sus posibilidades temáticas. Es quizás por esto mismo que sus escritos comienzan y a penas terminan, ya que la prosa es el fin en si misma.
April 3, 2020
Агамбен и идеята за филологическа меланхолия :)
November 20, 2022
Must read da literatura. Gostei das historinhas. Mas as vezes ele é meio vago e por isso 4 estrelas
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews