Monday, May 2, 2011

Jacques Derrida - Of Grammatology

I FINISHED THIS YESTERDAY. I HAVE NO IDEA HOW TO RESPOND TO THIS BOOK AT ALL.

FORTUNATELY THE WORLD CONTAINS SUCH AN EXCESS OF STUPIDITY THAT I AM STILL NOT THE DUMBEST GUY IN THE ROOM. REVIEWS OF THE BOOK REVEAL SOMETHING STARTLING AND QUITE UNIQUE: IT WOULD SEEM THAT ONE MAKES THE MOST SENSE OF DERRIDA, AND HAS THE MOST PROFOUND PHILOSOPHICAL EXPERIENCE, WHEN ONE DOES NOT READ HIM:


"Well, I made my way through most of this thing, but it's definitely something I'll come back to, again and again and again."


"His ideas were good ... I wouldn't recommend reading it cover to cover, I read it piece by piece and only those that were relevant to what I was studying (which of course Derrida himself would frown on because he would say it is by the context that we gain the meaning of what is being said)."


"Love Derrida, and this is the crux of his philosophy. I won't pretend I've read the whole thing as I'm not a bona fide philosophile, but Derrida's views on language have immeasurably influenced my own, and there are passages that are beautiful."


"Considering it's next to impossible to read, I got through more of this book than I ever imagined I would. There's a jumble of genius in there"


"ok so i only got thru about half of it, but i had something akin to an out-of-body experience once while thinking about it."


"Derrida's writing, because of its inherent need for argumentative clarity and rigor, can at times be difficult to decipher; therefore, do not obsess over every sentence; the overall meaning of the argument is much more important and often becomes clearer if you just plow through difficult passages."


"Don't quite know what Derrida is saying to me, but I like it."


"Yes it was amazing - does that mean I totally understood everything our old friend, Jacques was writing about? Absolutely not. But it's Derrida, so it's amazing - I would find it blasphemous for someone as lowly as myself to critique any of his works less than 'amazing.'"

No comments:

Post a Comment