jeremy fernando - reading blindly

7/24/2019 Jeremy Fernando - Reading Blindly

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Literau, Ohrns

nd Poibi

of n Eicl Rig

JERMY FNADO


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Rading

Bindly

Lterature thernessand the ossibty

of an thical eading

JEEY FENNO

-

CAMBRIA

PRESS

AMHT, NW YOK


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Copyright 2009 Jeremy Feando

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

No pat of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced

into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means

(electronic, mechanical, photocopying recording or otherwise) with

out the prior permission of the publisher.

Requests for permission should be directed to:[email protected] or mailed to

Cambria Press

20 Northpointe Parkway, Suite 188

Amherst, NY 14228

Cover concept by Michele Andrea Wan.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fernando, eremy.

Reading blindly literature, otheess and the possibility of an ethi

cal reading / eremy Feando.

p. cm.Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 97860497-6335 (alk paper)

I. Reader response criticism. 2 Hermeneutics 3 Literature Explication4. LiteraturePhilosophy I. Title.

PN98.R3847 200980'.95dc2

2009028207


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For Brendan Quigley, who taught me how to write

(even as I remain complete blind to it);

Neil Murph who unveiled my blindnesst reading

in reading, and when reading

and Werner Hamache who once told me to"trust no one-not even me-and just read for yourse

Thankyou for being my teachers, my mentors

and most of al my dear friends


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If the serpents had written History they would have

proudly related how ther ancestor had belonged to woman.

And it was during love dispute between woman and her

companion, a dispute god had every interest in no one ever

knowing he had been the adulterous cause as for any

oriental god that the jealous companion violently seized

her serpent But serpents are a people with no writing and

it is god who has the word

-Hlne Cixous La


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Who could well say: I fear we cannot rid ourselves of God,

because we still believe in grammar." A belever still

a friend of men!

But if you still believe in grammar it is because the idea

of being able to rid yourself of god fills you with terror. Fear

of no-lfe fear of life

Hlne Cixous La


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TABLE OF CONENS

Stumblng Around in the Dark xi

Introducton: On Reading: A Pac With the Devil

Part I

Blndness 5

Chapter Blindness, or Wha Is This

No-Thing We See? 9

The Book as a (Death) Sentence

Blind Ethics, or Cose Your Eyes(to) See he Third 31

Lierary Theo and the Erasure of Texs 41

Chapter 2: The Contract: Venus in Furs,

or How o Read the Other 5

A Quesion of Violence; A Satement of Terror

A Question of Reading, or "A Lies

in he Gap Between the Painting

and he Viewer"

Wha Is To Be Done? or How o Read

While Maintaining Radical Oherness

The Reader Before the Law,

or What Is My Right of Inspecion

6

6

67


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x READNG BLNDLY

Part

Reading(s)

Chapter Rereading Miller:

J Stands Before the Law Forever Undecided, or "Who Is the Wo

That Is Reading? 89

Reading and Testing: Reading as esting 92Putting Back Before the Law 95

Chapter 4: Reading Roland Bartes,

Rereading Roland Bartes

(Writing Roland Bartes 0

Reading (Writing) How What, and a Secret II

Do This in Memory of Me

Capter Only Fiction Is Stranger

Than Fiction

Part l

Te Reader

Chapter 6 Reading. Or Just Gaming

Spinning Mixing Scratching Cutting, Stabs... 139

Bibliography

Index 6

About the Author 67


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STUMBLING RO

I THE DA

I was on that journey and nearly at Damascus when aboutmidday a bright lght from heaven suddenly shone roundme. I fell to the ground and heard a voce saying, "Sau,Saul, why are you persecuting me? I answered: Who areyou, Lord? and he sad to me, "I am Jesus the Nazarene,

and you are persecuting me The people with me sawthe light but did not hear his voce as he spoke to me. Isaid: What am I to do Lord? The Lord answered, "Standup and go nto Damascus, and there you wl be told whatyou have been appointed to do. The lght had been sodazzling that I was blind and my companions had to takeme by the hand; and so I came to Damascus.'

Aer the crucxon, this s arguably the most motant scene

n Chrstianty In fact, one can argue that n the context o


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xii REDING BLINDLY

Christianiy as a concept, this scene is more imporant than the

death of Jesus. For it is only with Paul that the term Christian

comes into being:2 the birh of Jesus itself would have fullled

the condition of his coming; in this sense, his death is supeu-

ous.3 The movement from a title ("Jesus the Christ or "Jesus

the Savior) to a name ("Jesus Christ, where "Jesus and "Sav

ior become one and the same) required not so much his death,

but rather a betrayal, much the same way as the movement fromname ("Julius Caesar) to a title ("Caesar) also required one. In

this sense, the two key gures in the formation of Christianity are

Judas and Paul Jesus being the medium through and in which

it was created Judas' betrayal moved the name into a singular

Pauls writings transformed the singular into the universal.

But for Saul to be created, Saul had to rst move through a period

of blindness, and it is this that we must look at for the moment

The rst question that arises from the above passage from theActs of the Apostles is, if "the people with me saw the light,

then why did they not go blind, as Saul did? Aer all, he claims

that "the light had been so dazzling that I was blind. Either he

had been seeing a "light from heaven that was dierent from

the light his companions saw, or he was lying (Saul didnt have

the best of reputations), or he was mistaken about the cause of

his blindness For if it was not the rst two possibilities then

would the case be that Sauls blindness was not caused by the

light, but rather by the "voice [that] spoke to me that his com

panions did not hear?4 n this sense, does Saul need to be blind

to the Word in order that he can truly discover what the Word is?

In order for Saul to fulll his role of being the "chosen one] to

know [Gods] will, to see the Just One and hear his own voice

speaking,5 he would rst have to be blind to all that was being

written (and perhaps even said) about God. This was the only


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Stumbling Around in the Dak xi

way in which h could ransubsania himslf fom a Pais

ino h s Chrisian: h movmn fom Saul o Paul qui

a momnary blindnss.

Th is alray a hin of h mann in whic h blid

nss would ac Saul arlir in h passag, whn answs

a qusion ("Saul, Saul, why a you pscuing m?) wih

anohr qusion ("Who ar you Lod?) I is no so much ha

h did no ha h qusion bu ha h was abl o discn whah "voic was rally asking h "voic was no lookig fo a

ason for Saul's pscuion (ar all, as God, wouln (S)h

alrady know why?) bu fo an acknowldgmn ha (S)h was

God I was his ha Saul rcogniz in his spons; vn whil

h was asking who h voic ha was spaking was, h ha

alrady acknowldgd i as "Lord I was roug his blindnss

ha Saul coul uly s h "wil of "h Jus On

Wha draws boh Judas an Saul oghr is h moivaion

in hir acions On can nvr rally ask wha hi psoal

innion is-ha is nvr knowabl-bu on can posi (o a

las hypohsiz) h racs ha can b found in hir acions

Boh Juas and Saul bray hir xising siuaions, h rsul

of which is a craion of somhing nw wihou hi bay

als, h nams "Jsus Chris and "Chrisian would no xis

Bu i is no ha hir brayals ar in opposiion o hir siua

ions Wha Judas and Saul hav don is o b blin o h ov

rading of wha hir siuaions dmand (oby Jsus unqus

ionigly and b a goo Phais, spcivly) o lisn o h

scr mssag ha no on ls wan, o paps was abl, o

s, o har ("Jsus had o di in ordr o fulll h prophcy

and "h coming of God was prcisly h coming of h Chris

ian, rspcivly) Whn Jsus asks Juas, "Ar you braying

h Son of Man wih a kiss?6 i wasn a qusion ing of


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xiv REDING BLNDLY

appropriateness of the gesture: aer all, one cannot betray in the

absence of love.7 In order for Judas to act in delity to the work

and life of Jesus, he had to betray him-he had to be blind to the

ovet teachings, all the laws, and also all the other disciples n

the same way, Saul had to betray the laws of the Sanhedrin, the

Jewish laws and his training and life as a Pharisee in delity to

this "voice that no one else could hear

A similarity can be found in the case of Btus and Julius Cae

sar the betrayal and murder of Caesar had to happen in order to

preseve the state; it was Brutus' love for what Caesar worked

and stood for that resulted in his having to kill Caesar to pre

vent him from destroying his own creation n this sense, both

Judas and Brutus betrayed the ones they loved in delity to what

both Jesus and Caesar, respectively, stood for: Brutus and Judas

betrayed Caesar and Jesus for the persons they were becoming,

for becoming persons who were other to what they had stood

for Since both betrayals were a response to what the other now

stood for they were a response in delity to the otherperhaps

an imagined other, a perfected other, a deied other, even, but

nonetheless an otherwhich suggests that the acts were initiated

by Jesus and Caesar themselves, almost as if Judas and Brutus

were called by Jesus and Caesar to betray the Jesus and Caesar

they had become n Jesus case, this seems obvious enough

someone had to betray the Son of Man in order that he could be

crucied and resurrected His transguration from man to deity

required the betrayal Judas role was to respond to this call One

could argue that Judas betrayal of Jesus had to occur other

wise, Jesus would have become God on earth (after all, he was

building a following) n order to prevent that from happening

which would have been Jesus usurpation of God the father),

Judas had to respond to Jesus by betraying him, murdering him.

n Brutus case, one can argue that his murder of Caesar was


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Stumblng Around in the Dark xv

a response to Caesar's name itsel as Avtal Ronell eegantly

argues n T Ts v:

The very thng meant to do away wth Caesar reasserths nae. If Brutus was abe to cut Caesar down, hs actcou ot amount to a cut intated by hm, one mght say,because the cut is Caesar n hs deant totaity; from hsbth Caesar bears the nang name of the cut The act of

ndependence was prescrbed by the nae of the other.9

rutus roe was precisey to brng the caesura to ts full poten

tial. If one considers Pauls role from this angle (the bringing to

the fullness of potentiality the nae of Jesus Christ), then per

haps Sauls betraya of the Pharisees was only the rst moment:

n order to complete the movement fro Jesus the man to Jesus

the universal God (whch Judas begins, Paul had to betray

Jesus the dety himself Since only Pau had heard the "voice,

in eect he s now not only Pythia but the Oracle itself (at least

in the case of Pythia, there were prests that were translating her

words, there were others prvy to understanding, interpretng the

divne words in Pau's case, he was both recever and transa

tor, egslator and executioner).10 In order to cathoicize Jesus,

Pau had to become God himsef in order to create the universal

Jesus, what Paul had to rst do was totalze the Word, to cement

a particular verson of the Word, to wrte out al other versions

Snce Paul s the only one who heard the "voice, whatever he

claimed s true, or, ore precisey, al of Pauls statements are

truth-clams, constative stateents by staking a clam to the

"voce (which no one can dspute, no one else havng heard the

"voice), Pau s, n eect, the "voice Whether Pauls action

was driven by a selfcentred motive, a selsh motive (to become

an aposte, a specialy chosen one, to become the undisputed

leader of the Chrstans, etc), or whether it was a response to a


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xvi REDING BLINDLY

call of the divine, a response to the "voice of God, a response to

the other, will never be known: we will always remain blind to

Paul's intent All that we can disce is that this betrayal of God

by becoming the voice of God himself was necessary in order to

universalize the Christian. Hence, in our reading of Paul, Paul

himself will always remain blindpaque, invisiblto us All

that we can ever know is about Paul we will never know the

character of Paul, but instead, all we know is the character Paul.One might also consider the fact that Paul did not author the

Acts of the Apostles; the only potential author ever suggested

has been Luke, as he is considered a close companion of Paul

(being from Antioch, there is a chance that he might even have

been present at the rst use of the term Christian). In this sense

the Saul-and later Paul-of the Acts of the Apostles is a char

acter in the narrative of the author Interestingly, nowhere in

his own writings does Paul mention the fact of his blindness

In fact, the closest he comes to doing so is when he states that

aer being chosen by God, he "went o to Arabia . [for] three

years and later straight from there back to Damascus;12 in this

case, there is yet another blindness, a blind spot of three years

about which nothing is known Could it be that Paul had to sup

press the fact that his "vision was one of lindness, that his

vision of God was precisely one of nothing? nstead of being

enlightened, all he had was momentary darkness.

Assum ing that the author of the Acts of the Apostles is consis

tent, why is there, then an inconsistency between the narratives

in Acts 93-9 and the passage which we have been reading? For

Acts 9:7 states that "the men traveling with Saul stood there

speechless for though they heard the voice they could see no

one, which contradicts Acts 229, which states, "the people

with me saw the light but did not hear hs voce as he spoke to

me This reopens the possibility of Sauls nontruthtelling, but


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Stumblng Around in the Dark xvii

a mor insing considraion is why such an obvious incon

sisncy was lf in plac. Is i simply an indirc way of sug

gsing ha h a din "voics ha can b hard, o is

his anoh blind spo in h x? f w ad boh Acs 9 and

Acs 22 as bing ru, hn h rason for Saul's blindnss is

ulimaly unknown; Saul and all his copanions s h ligh

and har h voic bu only Saul is blindd as a rsul. n his

sns, vn h ason fo his blindnss is now unknown o us.

And i is in his siuaion of absolu bindnss-Saul was

blind whils blind o h caus of his own blindnss as w ar

ooha h Chrisian is bo. is in his blindnss ha h

hirdh Chisianha rupus h binary opposiion of

JwGnil is bo is in his blindnss ha a nw rm (h

Christian)was bo wih in h xising sysm of h inking Juda

ism); in Alain Badious ms his would b an insanc of a u

vn wh h is a nw ponialiy ha opns up wihin an

xising concpion, an xising spac, an xising wold. Fo i

is no as if wih h coming of h Chrisian ha Judaism was

ovrhrown: h fac ha hy ar simila for h mos pa sug

gss ha Chrisianiy is a nw concpion of Judais, on in

which h JwGnil opposiion no long is crucial. Th ky

omn would b h gsur of imaginaionwhr somhing

is don wihou any a priori knowldg of h consquncs

Ar all, Saul had no ida ha his momn of blindnss, of no

sing of noknowinghis illgiima lap of faihwould

lad o h birh of a nw m a nw possibiliy Only in his

way migh somhing nw occur3


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xiii RAIG BLILY

ENDNOTS

I. Acts 22:611. All references to the Bible are taken from the Jerusalem ble

2. The rst known use of the term Chrstan can be found in Acts 1126"It was at Antioch that the disciples were rst called Christians.

3. It is Islam that recognizes the pointlessness of the death on the

cross (and even the resurrection): sa goes staght to heaven (hismovement from human to divine did not require death) The dif

ference between Islam and Christianity is precisely the movement

of his name in Islam, Isa does not move from a singular into a

universal, but om an individual name to a universal title

4. There have aso been interpretations that Saul was in the centre ofthe light-it "shone around him (Acts 226) Even if this were so,it does not change the fact that the cause of his blindness was not

so much the light but something other than that.

5 Acts 2214-156. Luke 224897 If there was no love then it would merely be an act of complic

ity to murder. It is only with love that i is a betrayal for n every

betrayal there is the break of a previous commonaliy, singular

plurality (where two singular persons were linked by a common

idea, goal, belie. In this sense the betrayal is always a double

betrayal, of the other person and also of the idea, and in this dou

ble betrayal, love tself is shattered.

8. In a way this was the logic that was explored inJesus Chrst uperstar (music and lyrics by Andrew loyd Webber and Tim Rice) inthe musical it was Judas who realized that esus was becoming too

much of a superstar and hence had to betray him in order o save

Jerusaem which was esus' intention in the rst place.

9 Avital Ronell, he est rve (Chicago University of IllinoisPress, 2005), 310 An excellent meditation on loyalty betrayaland love in Brutus and Cordelia from Julus Caesar and Kng

ear respectively, can be found in he est rve 307310


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Stumblng Around n the Dark xix

10. Paul s constanty referring to himsef as one who is "caled tobe an apostle, an specally chosen to preach the Good News(Rom: 1-2), gnoring the fact that he wasn't actuay one of thetwelve "apponted by God [ no less] to be an aposte (I Cornth ans I); "an aposte who does not owe hs authorty to men butwho has been appointed by Jesus Christ and by Go the Fatherwho rase Jesus from the dea (Gal. ). In other words Paulaid cam to the appointment of interpreter of the Word of God:snce he was the one who hear the "voce one can construe that

he has appointe himsef as the nterpreter of the Word.I "The ony dentcation of the author ever suggested by the

church writers s St Luke and no critcs ancent or mode haveever seriously suggested anyone else This denticaton wasalready known to the churches about the year 175 AD as shownby the Roman canon known as the Muratoran Fragment .ands suppored by inteal evdence: the author must have been aChristan of the apostoc age ether a thoroughly heensed Jewor more probably, a wel educated Greek with some knowedge

of medcine an extremely well acquainte wth the XX anJewish things in genera asty, an more sgnicantly he hadaccompanied Paul on hs joueys juging from his use of the rstperson plural n Part 2 of the Acts an of al Pauls companonsnone is more strongy nicate than Luke ntrouction to TheActs of the Apostles in the ew Testamen 195.

2. Gal. 913 Ths w be expored in greater detai in the chapter "Blind Ethcs

or Cose Your Eyes (to) See the Thir Baiou dscusses the "trueevent amongst other places in Being and Event 2006)


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RadingBlindly


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INTRODUCTON

ON RADING

A PCT WTH THE DEVL

How does one read properly, that is ethically?

n an examination of this question, a questioning of the ques-tion there is an obvious link between the terms how and ethi-cally; both involve choice and choosing. Whenever a "how isinvoked, the subject has to choose between one or more optionsHowever, for a situation to involve ethics there must be a choicemade in which the singularity making the choice is responsibleto and for all the other(s) in that situation: it is this singularitythis particularity which makes the choice a proper one There is acrucial dierence between the choice in the situation of a "howand the choice in an "ethical situation. The choice in "howinvolves alteatives which are already laid out before us: hencethe decision made is calculated calculable part of a system n atrue ethical situation the choice is always made in a moment of


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2 REDNG BLINDLY

bindness: the outcome (and even the situation leading up to it) isunknowabe.'

So is how to read propery, ethicaly," and then more precisey how to read as if each reading is a singar sitation"an impossible question? Or, if not an impossible qestion-afteral we did as itthen perhaps a question that can ony remaina question, one that cannot be cosed o be competed and,by extension, be theorized (in the ense of forming a competetheory about it)?

Ethica reading is a conception of reading as a space of (andfor) negotiation The moment of reading is the moment whenthe how" and ethics" colide; one can never read in a vacuum(both the text and the reader have their respective historicities)but in order to read, the reader must be free to respond fy tothe text In this way, we face two contradictory demands onemust read as if for the rst time, that is, without any preconceived notions of reading or of the text bt at the same time itis impossibe to read without any prior nowedge of readingand this makes the situation aporetic Aer al, we are bo intoreading; reading precedes us, and mch of reading reies on conventions But it is precisely in this space that the negotiation andchoosing tae pace Each decision and each choice, is tempora, and each instance of reading is a new oneno two readings wi be the same t is within this space, this tempora-and

singuarspace that reading can occr as a singuarity and inwhich a potentialy new reading can occr

If each reading is temporal and hence potentiay new, it opensp this question: Is a virgina reading possibe? Can one read as

if reading for the rst time?2 his brings into qestion the status of memo and forgetting with respect to reading Clearlymemory is part of the process of reading one must rememberthe res of anguage and one mst aso remember what one


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On Reading 3

has read prior to reading what is in front of one One must also

always keep in mind what is ahead of one. This is especiallytrue when one is reading to unearth the movement of thought in

a text, when one is attempting to unveil the dierent registers

in the text: one must speculate what is not-yetread, one mustremember the future, for otherise, one cannot project how

what one is currently reading ts in with respect to the entire

text3 However, in order to open these registers, to allow these

dierent readings to potentialy surface, one must also forget

what one has read, what one is reading; otherwise, one is merely

reiterating what one already knows At every point of readingthat sponds to the potentiality of the text, there must be a for

getting that occurs prior to the reading: each time one reads, no

reading takes place if one does not forget

t is precisely the double function of forgetting and memory

that results in anguage being both general and specic simulta

neously (and the two never being able to be reconciled) It is onlybecause forgetting is the ver basis of language4 that there is the

possibility that at each reading, a unique reading, a new reading

(a reading as if reading had never before occurred) might occur

t is forgetting that allows for the single instance of a new reading, but at the same time, t is memory (of language and, more

precisely, grammar and its rules) that allows for reading to takeplace at all Hence eve act of reading is when memo and

forgetting collide: every act of read ing is aporetic, as one has toboth remember and forget at the same time Each time readingoccurs, one is not just reading the text for the rst time, but also

reading for the rst time

It is forgetting that ensures that each reading is potentially avirginal reading: not a rst reading in the sense of an original

reading, but a rst reading in the sense of there never being a

second reading, there never being a repeated reading Aer all,


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4 REDING BLNDLY

is not the hymen another shield another veil another blind one

that only appears to be broken, split ruptured only to reveal that

one is within folds layers all of which reveal and unveil and

hide at the same time? Like the splitting of the veil in the temple

all that is revealed is that the secret of God remains an unknown

an unknowable which can only be sometimes glimpsed.

Of course the problem with forgetting is that it cannot be wiled

determined decided; it happens to one In oter words one cannotcount on foetting call on forgetting; not only does it happen to

one one might not even know ever know that forgetting has taken

place And once it has there is no object to forgetting: the moment

one can designate an object that is forgotten one is back in the

structure of memory In other words there is no referentiality to

forgetting. Hence one can never actually know of forgetting; it is

aways beyond the realm of knowledge And since reading that is

not merely a preconditioned hermeneutical decoding is premised

on the possibility of forgetting this suggests that we can never

quite know when or even whether reading itself occurs.

This suggests that reading can no longer be constituted in

the classica tradition of hermeneutics as an act of deciphering

meaning according to a determined set of rules laws: this would

be reading as an act where the reader comes into a convergence

at best with the text In fact reading can no longer be under

stood as an act since an act by necessity is governed by the

rules of reading Reading must be thought of as the event of anencounter with an other-an other who is not the other as identi

ed by the reader but rather an other that remains beyond the

cognition of the self Hence reading is a prerelational relational

ity an encounter with the oher without any claims to knowing

who or what this other is in the rst place; an unconditional rela

tion and a relation to no xed obect of relation. As such it is

the ethical moment par excelence.s


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On Reading 5

Since reading is an event of ethicity, it interdicts any precon

ditioned deteination of the encounter. As suc it cannot be

conceived as a phenomenal event Tis is due to the fact tat

a phenomena event is wat appears to te senses-a theory

of appearances-and is determined by its correspondence to

an existing conception; the event is subsumed under the self's"knowedge What the reader encounters may only be encoun

tered beore any phenoenonr at east, the point of encountering is always already beyond the readers knowing Hence,reading occurs as a nonphenomenal event, or more precisey,

as the event that undoes any possible teory of phenomenal

ity The scene of Sauls binding demonstrates tis, as it is not

a binding by a phenomenon but rater by the ve source ofpenomenaity itself, which remains invisible, undecipherable

and ultimately unknowable, irreducible to any concept of under

standing or reason Hence, it is the blinding not ony of the sub

ject of cognition-Sau-but also of te object of cognition; it isthe event of a double binding, an encounter that is completely

beyond cogniton, that is unknowable, that s n exception of

everything that is known As such, at every encounter, eacreading is an event of full potentiality, were nothing can be

known except the fact tat it is the event of an encounter

It is this potentiality that Saul saw when e was blind; it is this

potentiality tat was embodied n te new name of Paul How

ever, in order for te movement from Saul to Pau-in order forSau to become Paul-there is a necessary gap, a space, a bind

spot (whether it is tree days or three years is irreevant) in te

narrative; it is tis gap, this unknown, that opens up the space for

the becoming, for the Christian It is not possible to say wat thissite of negotiation, tis third tat lies between the Pharisee Sau

and Pau is The gesture of imagination, tis eap that is required

to move from Sau to Paua transubstantiated Saul, exacty te


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6 READNG BLINDY

same and slightly dierent at the same timis not one that canbe dened; it can only be described, narrated (and only aer theevent). Aer all, the rst time we are made aware of his newname is in Acts 13:9-"Then Saul, whose other name is Paul Itis not as if Saul had suddenly shed his old self and is now a newbeing Paul is his other within his old self, Paul is the becomingChristian of Saul n other words, Paul is the gap, the space withinSaul himself, the site of becoming that is th Christian. All thatcan be said is, perhaps what this site of negotiation is not in thissense, at best, all that can be said is proscriptive. This is preciselybecause the space of imagination is not an object but rather, thespace itself is what is being imagined it is the imagination ofthe possibility of the third, the third that is always in a state ofbecoming, that allows this transubstantiation to take place

This space of imagination, this imagination of a space, iswhat allows for reading to take place Aer all reading is neverdone, it is constantly becoming6

t was Saul's positing of the possibility of a space betweenthe Jew and the nonJew that gives rise to the term Christian. twas Sauls blindness to the fact that one cannot know the will ofGod-he had to act according to the "voice that he heard, thatonly he had heard and act according to this event, this singularitythat cannot be explained-that allowed for the Christian n orderto act, Saul had to read the voice in blindness-posit a readingthat is ultimately illegitimate and unveriable. Hence, the question that continues to haunt the work of Paul, the question thatcannot be answered, will always be, what did the voice say?

There is an echo of this in the eteal question that haunts theBible itself "Did God realy say you were not to eat from any ofthe trees in the garden? This is the question that is unansweredand never answerable aer all, no one will know what God saidto the woman. Even if we accept the validity of her words, "But


25/183

On Rding 7

of the tree in te mddle of the garden God sad, 'You must not eat

t, nor touc it, under pan of death 8-and the s no reason to

do otherwse-the queston of whether ths was realy wat God

sad remans. Aer all, a prohbton almost always gves rse to

a temptaton to de In ths sense, one can queston whether t sthe serpent that tempted, or whether t was really God who set the

scene in te rst place In fact, the serpent s tellng the truth when

t utters, "No! You wll not de! God knows n fact that on the day

you eat t your eyes wll b opened and you wll b lke gods know

ng good and evil, whch is precsely what appened 10 Aer eat

ing te frut, "the eyes of bot o them were open, the esult

of whch s tat Yahweh God acknowledges tat "man has become

lke one of us, with hs knowledge of good and evl2 In order

for woman and man to become lke G(s), they had to rst tu a

blnd eye to Yahwehs order to not eat from that tree

One mght also consder the exchange that s needed n order

to obtan the knowledge of good and evl. Yahweh Gods admo

ntion to man is, "You may eat ndeed of all the trees n the gar

den. Nevertheless of the tree of the knowledge of good and ev

you are not to eat, for on the day you eat of t you shall most

surely de3 In ths sense, one can take t that both woman

and man consume the fruit n the full knowledge that they are

sacrcing ther lves n echange for the "knowledge of good

and evl: t s ther g of death that was requred n order for

them to become "lke one of US."14 More than just te fact that

they had to gnore Yahweh Gods command, n order to become

like the Gods, they had to listen to the queston and decde for

themselves to gan the knowledge of good and evl, they rst

ad to choose Ths s a choce that s made n blndness, for

they knew not what they were choosng: aer all, one can hardly

clam that they, before knowng what good and evl were, were

makng a cogntve choce about good and evl


26/183

8 READING BNDLY

It is this pact with the serpent-the pact that God ad the ser

pent have in secret-that sets he scene for he woma to know of

the fruit aer all, if God created everything and has full knowl

edge of everything that is to happen, then both the serpet and the

question are also of Yahweh's creatio.16lt is this secret pact (even

though the serpent is a creation of Yahweh, Yahweh still needs

its complici in this matter: full knowledge does not necessarily

equate to full control) that opens the possibiliy o!he woman eat

ing the fruit in the rst place One must not forget that it is she who

rst ate of the tree; it is she who made the blind choice by positing

the possibility that perhaps God didt realy mean not to eat from

the tree It is this pact that maintains the possibility of questioning

and, more importantly, the possibility that humankind can choose

for itself, can have access to the "knowledge of good and evil It

is also the questio that esures that we ca cotinue readigas

knowledge can never totalize-that reading itself can continue

What this suggests is that a prescriptive answer to the ques

tions (how to read properly, that is, ethically did (s)he really say

that?) is impossible, for every staement would only hold true in

a particular moment, a particular situation, a singular momet

Aer all at her moment of choosig to eat of the tree, all the

woma could do is to posit whether God really said that or not

there is o certainly, only a possibility or a momentary potential

ity for it to be true It is these moments, these singuar particu

larities, that we will listen for (we canot always see them, for

they are hidden smewhere in the text, within the text, with the

text) All we can hope to do is to listen out for these moments,

these details, for as Jean Baudrillard reminds us, there is no er

parallel universe than that of the detail or the fragment

Freed from he whole and is rascedent verilouism,he deail ieviably becomes myserious


27/183

On Readig 9

Evry prtcl wrstd from th turl world s tslf mmdt subvrso of th rl d ts whoss.

Lk th frmt, t oly hs to b llptcl.It oly s to b xcptoEvry sulr m c b rckod xcptol.Ad t puts d to ll th othrs.7

It s oly bldss tt w c s xcptos; t s oly

xcptos tt w c s w w r bld. ly throuh tk- trms of t pculr t prtculr, t bsurd, v, c w

prhps puctur t ttd book rscu th txt th urd

t urdb such tt t book c vr b rd suc tht

rd c cotu. Prps to do so w ust rst ttmpt

to wrst th rl fro t rlty prcplTo wrst th m from th rprstto prcpl

o rdscovr th m s pot of covrc btwt lt from th objct d th lt from th z.19

T frmt s prcsly wr w c d rd s th vt

of coutr For t s oy w c coutr s tk s

xcpto (d, by xtso tt xcpto s th or) tt

rd s tcl vt c b bu to b tout. If c

coutr wt t txt s coutr wt frmt th o

uty c b stblsd by xtso, tr cot b ovr

rc wol wc c stbls tslf s rul d hc prcodto t vt of rd Hc, c vt of rd s

rd of frmt c rd s tsf frmt c vt

of rd s lso vt wr rd tslf s costtutd.

Tr s muc to l fro t provrb "T dvl s th

dtls: t s t sl ts t frmt th prtculr tht

prvts y totlz loc from tk plc, from u

tsf from sold tslf. Prps ths lt, or drkss


28/183

10 READING BLNDLY

there must be an attention to, a reading of, the smal, the unno

ticed, the little, and a bindness to a large, the whole. In this

way, there is a potential for the mysterious and the wonderful

to appear, and perhaps we can catch a gimpse of the pantoms

that haunt the text. Aer all, one can only see ghosts with the

third eye

But rst, perhaps we must begin to think of what this blindness

that we are thinking of is in the rst pace. Ad, perhaps more

accurately, what this blindness that we are thinking of is not. Is

it when we do not see that we are blind, or is it that we are blind

when we do not see: is blindness what we do not see, or does

bindness shape what we see in the rst place? n order to exam

ine the question, how does one read propery, that is, ethically?

one is faced with the issue of blindness and what it is one does

not see, cannot see Hence, we have to rst examine bindness

itself and its reation to reading Since there is a ink between see

ing and knowledge (captured perfecty in the phrase "Seeing isbeieving), we have to reect on the relationship between what

we can and cannot see, and, more specicaly, if what we cannot

see is always already part of what we see This would open the

consideration of the possibiity of knowing and the very iits of

knowledge itself, aer which we wil read texts that attempt to

think reading itself, that attempt to think the possibiity of read

ing For if we only attempt to speak of-write aboutreading

without reading anything, we might then just be speakwritingof everything but reading. By attempting to read, perhaps we can

begin to meditate on what the text is as such, what the object that

we are reading is (if it even is an object), and how we can start

to approach it. And since reading is the relationship between the

reader and the text, we must then turn our attention to how read

ing aects the reader; the ects of the text, and reading, on the

body, in the body, of the reader n this way, we might be able


29/183

On Reading 11

to begin thinking of how both the reader and the text read each

other write onto each other into each other.

However we must begin at the beginning by taking a detour

trough bindness-and what blindness entails in the rst place

Aer all, if we refuse to acknowledge what we cannot see refuse

to see that we cannot aways see we might remain stumbling

around in the dark


30/183

12 RAIG BLY

ENDNOTS

I Of course to deny that an ethica stuation s aso hstorical-t

has ts ghosts that contnue to haunt twoud be siy. However

at the moment of decson of choosing one has ttle choce but

to be bind to both the historcties (eading to the choce) and the

potentiaties (of the choce), and acknowedge the doube bnd

ness of choosing2 Is ths even a queston for the ntroducton one that must be asked

from the ve beginnng or must t be e to the ve endan

invtaton to begin agan to start again to read againa queston

that can ony be uttered when the readng s over when the text s

nished a queston that can ony be known at the ve end? Can

you reay ask a queston about begnnings about orgns wthout

an dea of the end in mind? Or another way to put the question:

is there a possbity of a begnnng wthout the notion of an end?

n this sense the queston of origns s not just an archeoogcaproect but aways a teeoogica one as we

3 Reading n this form s aways a readng of the specc with rea

ton to the genera-readng the particuar text n reaton to the

unversa book The assumpton here of course is that there s a

totaty whch s the book to be referenced aganst to be compared

wth to be kept n mnd Ths suggests then that reading can ony

occur the second time one ooks at a text or even more radcay

that each reading s aways a second readng

4. The ony tme one has to utter something s n ts absence if the

object that was referred to were present then there woud be no

necessity to utter the sgnier. The very recoection of the sign

ed to one's mind is premised on the fact that it was momentary

forgotten; otherwse there woud not be a rememberng that was

takng pace f the sgned were aready in one's mind t woud

be purey knowedge Hence the very conditon of anguage

tsef-the fact that one has to refer to somethng and communi

cate this to someone ese by anguages precisey forgettng f

one never forgot there woud be no need for anguage at a


31/183

On Reading 13

An excellent instance of the thinking of the status of memory

and forgetting can be found, among oter placesin the writings of

Werner Hamacer including "Hermeneutic Ellipses: Writing te

Hermeneutic Circle in Schleiermacer in Premises: Esss onPhlosophy and Literature from Kant to Celan, trans. Peter Fenves(Stanford CA: Meridian 1999)44-80

5 l owe much of this analysis to a conversation with WeerHamacher

6 It is perfectly apt that the tem read both signies te past and te

present tense of the same process In reading tere is te collisionof bot the past and te present memory and forgetting; perhaps

reading is always a future possibility a potentiality

7 Gen31 (italics added)8 Gen 3:3 Te only recorded words are wat God said to man we

only hear of what God said to the woman from her representation

and perhaps interpretation-of the admonition not to eat from te

tree

9 Gen345

10 t was not the eating from the fruit of te tree of knowedge tatcaused man and woman to lose eteal life it was the fact tat

aer eating from te tree tey were banished from te garden

and so were unable to eat from the tree of life: "See the man has

become ike one of us wit his knowedge of good and ev He

must not be allowed to stretc his hand out next and pick from te

tree of ife aso and eat some and ive fo ever (Gen 322

II. Gen 3:72 Gen 322

3 Gen2:1617

4 Gen 3:22

5 It is this choosing that is blind to both te law and what it

choosestis choice tat was made in double bindnesstat we

will examine that we will attempt to see And in trying to tink

the questionow to read properly that isethically? we will allow

the other question did (she really say that? to haunt us to ques

tion us to question te question itself

16 In eect the serpent is the autoimmunity of Yahweh in order to

ensure tat Yahweh's law would not be fully obeyed would not


32/183

CHAPTER 1

BLIDESS, OR

WHAT IS HIS

No-HIG WE EE?

Bindness is the condition of lacking visual perceptiondue to physiologica or psychological factors .Totalblindness is the complete lack of form and light percep-

tion and is cinicaly recorded as "NLP, an abbreviationfor no light perception1

When something is written onto a page there is an inscription

made and the page is marked there is a mark e behind The

only way which we can read that mark is when ight reects

from it and forms an image that goes through the pupi and is

focused on the retina Sensory ces rom the retina reate the

image via neurons onto the visua cortex which is the part o the


33/183

READING BLINDLY

be a totalizing law: the serpent's question opened the possibility

that the woman consumed the fruit, and as a result, humankind

became "one of us and received the knowledge of the God(s)

themselves.

17 Jean Baudrillard The Intellgence of Evil or the Lucid Pact,

trans. Chris Tuer (Oxford Berg Publishers, 2005), 103.18 To rediscover reading as the point of emergence-negotiation

spacebetween the text and the reader. To think the punctum-

a point stop, break puncture prick-of the attened page the

punctum that lets the text be a text, that allows reading to continueIt is Roland Barthes who never lets us forget that it is punctuation

that allows the sentence to stop pause, but never to settle, as it is

punctuation that also breaks, punctures; at best it is a momentary

rest. Barthes meditation on punctuation and the punctum can be

found in many places one of which is Camera Lucda { 980)19 Baudrillard The Intellgence of El \04


34/183

PART I

BLNDNESS


35/183

I a: f o of my f oboy ca fac

wo w y op a m.

-Sama Ru, Midnight's Children


36/183

It is like a ruin that does not come after the work but

remains produced, always already from the origin by the

advent and structure of the work In the beginning at the

origin there was ruin. At the origin comes ruin; ruin comes

to the origin it is what first comes and happens to the

origin in the beginning With no promise of restoration

This dimension of the ruinous simulacrum has never

threatened-quite to the contrarythe emergence of a

work t's just that one must know [savoir], and so one just

has to see (it) [voir ca]-Le that the performative fiction

that engages the spectator in the signature of the work is

given to be seen only through the blindness that it produces

as its truth As if glimpsed through a blind

Jacques Derrida Memoir o/the Blind:

The Se-Portrait and Other Ruin


37/183

20 READNG BLNDLY

brain that processes the information. But the only way in which

the image is formed s for some of the ligt to be absorbed by

te image itsef (otherwise, all we woud see is pure ight, an

imageless brightness) This means that there is always some part

of te object-the etter, te word, or te series of words-tat

remains unseen, that remains in the dark

What we are interested in is this residue this tat is le behind

the gost of the word that remains unseen: perhaps the only way

wich we can see te dark is to be blind in the rst place

Just because something does not appear to be there does not

mean tat it isn't tere, does not mean that it isnt experienced as

being tere In many cases someting that is absentor, more

precisely that appears to be absentan aect us just as much

as something that is present

I placed a coee cup in front of Jon and asked him to

grab it [wit his pantom imb]. ust as e said he wasreacing out, I anked te cup awa"Ow! e eed "Dont do tat!"Wats te matter?"Dont do that, he repeated " ad ust got my ngersaround te cup hande when you pued it. Tat realyurts!Hod on a minute. I wrenc a rea cup from phantom ngers and te person es, ouch! The ngers were ilusory,

but the pain was reaindeed, so intense tat

dared notrepeat the eperiment2

If an absent limb can aect one, can it really be all that absent? Is

it not te trace of the limbbe it via psychoogical eects, or even

physioogical ones3tat continues to haunt te body the spectre

of Johns ngers that continue to be with him, inscribing them

seves into his body but this time not necessarily within is con

trol? Johns spectra ngers are absent in a cognitive sense-he no


38/183

Blindness, or What is This No-Thing We ee? 21

longer can control them with his brain-but are very much present

sipping in and out of his presence and disappearing the oent he

atepts to directly confnt them.

He one must consider if a phantom limb has eects ony

because one has a memory of its sensation, a memory of the sensa

tion that was caused by stimuli to the limb before its absence In

other words is the sensation felt by the patient merely that of a

psychological eect? Or more precisely is the sensation felt by the

patient the result of both the memory of the limb and also the for

getting of the fact that the limb itself is missing? For if the missing

limb emains in the consciousness of the patient then would it not

be unlikely that (s)he feels a sensation in it? If the sensation is trig

gered by an aect of memo, this suggests that it must be beyon

merely physiological stimui; since all exteal stimuli are absent

it is alost as if the patient feels the sensation because there is an

anticipation of what is to be felt. This is perhaps a similar sensation

to that one feels just before one is tickled: the only way in which

one can feel ticklish even before actual physical stimuli is experi

enced is because one knows what feeling ticklish is In eect the

ticklishness is anticipated and then is felt by the person.4

This might be why the most successful attempts to treat patients

with phantomlimb pain have involved the imagination One sch

insnce is the "mirror box that was created by Vilayanur S. Ram

achandran and colleagues A "mirror x is a x with two mirrors

in the center one facing each way A patient inses her or his hand

into one hole and her or his "phantom hand into the other When

viewe from an angle the brain is tricked into seeing two co

pete hands. The "mirror box treatment is based on an observation

that phantomlimb patients were more likely to repor paralyze

and painful phantoms if the limb was paralyzed prior to ampa

tion The hypothesis is that eve time the patient atempts to move

her or his limb, (she receives sensory feedback that the ib is


39/183

22 READING BINDLY

paralyzed. Over time, this feedback samps iself into the brain such

that even when the limb is absent the brain has leat tha he limb

and its subsequen phantom) is paralyzed Hence he patien feels

discomfort or even pain because the phantom limb is in an uncom

forable position or is paralyzed If the brain is ricked ino seeing

two complee hands when he hand that is present moves he brain

thinks hat he phantom limb is also moving; in his way the per

son can move" her or his phanom limb and so the brain no longer recognizes it as a paralyzed limb More recently viual reality

has been used o trea suerers of phanom-limb pain; by ataching

the presen limb o an interface tha shows two limbs moving he

somatosensoy coex is ricked again6 Both the mirror box and

he virual-reality interface (developed by he Universiy of Man

cheser work on he same principle of visual-kinesthetic syneshe

sia excep tha the illusion is stronger in the laer

is through the use of iaginaionot acceping he absenceas a lack bu hera a spec that is present but canno be encoun

ered dictlyhat he sympoms suered by phanom limb

patients can be treated This is no merely he cation of a substi

tute formation in the sense hat Freud himself asseed, which is

the manufacuring of a [formation] which recompnses the subjec

for his loss of reali7 n Freud's case, he subsitute foration

allows one o ignore the cause and simulae one in order to reat

he symptoms as long as he paien believes that one is reatingthe cause, the symptoms will go away his use of the imagina

ion is more radical as he concep of the causriginis done

away wih: it maters not if the limb in question is presen or absen

phantom both are trated as if they are one and he same The

line beween the real and the virual is erased In fact

all ampees, and all who work with them know ha a

phantom limb s essenial if an articial limb s o be used.


40/183

Bld, or Wha Th N-Thg W S? 23

D Michael Kame wites: "Its value to the amputee isenomous. am quite cetain that no amputee with anatcial lowe lmb can walk on t satsfactoily until thebody-image, in othe wods the phantom is incopoatedno it

Thus he disappeaance of a phantom may be disastousand its ecovey its eanimation a matte of ugency

One such patient unde my cae descbes how he mustwake up his phantom in the monings Only then canhe put on his posthesis and wal g

t is thus the imagination that allows fo the bih of the thid tem,

the phantomeal limb the limb that is viual but which eats the

symptoms of not only the eal (absent) limb but also the virual

phantom) limb t is the imaginaton that no only bidges the gap

beween the eal and the phantom but moe adically allows fo the

ealviual the viualeal to exist n this manne what cannotbe seen can potentially be expeienced be momenaily glimpsed

Howeve even though he imagination is the space in which

teatment of phantomlimb pain takes place one can neve deny

that thee is physiological aspect Even as thee must be a fo

geing of the fact that the limb is absent one cannot completely

oget the limb as well; if that wee so thee would be no mem

oy of its sensation at all Hence the phantom-limb sensation is

neithe puely psychological no physiological Hee we haveto tu to auice eleauPony and conside his claim that

what has to be undestood then is how the psychic detemnng factos and the physological conditions gea intoeach othe it is not clea how the imaginay limb if dependen on physoogica condtons and theefoe theesul of a thid peson causality can in anothe conteta o the pen hstoy of the paten hs memo

ries. motons v')


41/183

24 REDING BLINDLY

This suggests that sensations are neither purely from exteal stim

li nor purely from internal cognition: there is rather an interplay

between the two where the body discovers itself via the world and

also discovers the world through itself. Hence, the phantom limb "is

not the mere outcome of objective causali; no more is it a cogita

tio.10 Lyin in the indistinct space between cognition and exteal

stimuli the sensation felt by the patient is similar to a reex-an

action that is neither merely a reaction to stimuli nor fully coni

tive. In fact "reex movements whether adumbted or executedare still only objective processes whose course and results con

sciousness can obsee but in which it is not involved11

he reex does not arise from obective stimli btmoves back toards them and invests them with a meaning which they do not possess taken sinly a psychoogical agents bt ony hen taen as a situation ..he

ree in so far as it open itself to the meaning of a sitation and perception in so far as it does not rst of allposit an obect of knoledge and is an intention of orhole being are modalities of a pre-objetive view...12

Hence all cognitionve act of knowingan only happen ret

rospectively the meaning of the reex can only be inferred aer

the fact. In other wors the phantomlimb sensation can only be

known at the ve moment in which it is felt where the "experi

ence does not survive as a representation in the mode of objectiveconsciousness and as a 'dated moment it is of essence to survive

only as a matter of being and with a ceain degree of general

ity.13 It is a "personal existence without in other words being

able either to reduce the organism to its existential self or itsel to

the organism4 Hence the phantom limb "is not a recollection it

is a quasipresent and the patient feels it now ..with no hint of it

belonging to the past.5


42/183

Blindness, or W hat is This No-Thng We See? 25

Ev m h s snson n h phnom lmb s n

vn unknowbl unl h momn n whch s fl; s boh

objcv nd subjcv pcdn boh h conv sub

jc nd lso h v objc of conon sl o vn s h

phnom-lmb n s bl n h lm of h mnon hs

s mn of s sympoms h cus nd h vy sus of h

snson sl mns unknown nd ulmly unnowbl.

Jus bcus somhn s no wn on p dos nomn h s no h Phps n od o d poply on

mus lwys spond o boh wh s nd wh s noo ls

sms no o bh16 Phps hn dn s h c

h snsonh ls byond boh h d nd h x s

somhn h cn only b xpncd n s snul suon

nd known bs only ospcvly O mo dclly sll

on mus lwys h bsn s (ponl) psn s

ll h hossh phnoms h hun h xh mnnh unknowby of h x h kp fom bcomn book

THE BOOK AS A (DEAH) ENENCE

Fo hs s h wy n whch lons won o d ou:und h sn nln ys of n ohodox domsm h myhcl mss of lon sysmzds sum o of hsoc vns on bns pphnsvy o dfnd h cdbly of h myhs whl h sm m on ooss ny connuon of hnul vly nd owh h fn fo myh pshsnd s lc s kn by h clm of on o hsocfoundons 17

h momn lon shs fom movmn consnly

chnn mohn nd bcomn no snncybn

docn book (nd mo pcsly pscpv boo}ll


43/183

26 READING BLINDLY

"vitality and growth are drained from t: it s the systematization

of the movement into a inear series, "a sum tota of historical

events, into a logca sequence, a Socratic "knowledge by rea

son, which drains the movement and settles it into a structure,

where t becomes ifeless, dead. By attempting to fuy under

stand the religion-to move it from myths which are dynamic,

everchanging, constanty retod, altered, alive, becomng, to a

set story, a history, near, predctable, retraceabe uncontamnated by variationwhat happens is the death of the reigon

itsef into mere dogma and orthodoxy

In the same way, it is the attempt to fuly grasp the meanng

of the textin order that words contan a totaity of meaning,

under a partcular category of understandingthat ultimately

destroys the text, that destroys the potentiality of a text Consd

ering that there is no ogic which can sustan itself"no proof

can possibly exist determining the truth or falsity of the unde

cidable statement in the anguage of the system within which the

statement was formuated'8in order for there to be any tota

ity (in the form of a consistent ogic that can prove itself withn

its own logical system), some form of exclusion, by way of the

suppression of the axom that does not conform to the interna

logic of the system, must take pace.

In order for a text to transubstantiate itself nto a book, some

part(s) of it must be le out; in order that a text (which is a ver

sion, a single reading, a potential readng) s transformed into,

becomes, a book (a complete readng, a consistent reading, or

even the only reading), some parts of the text must always be

ether subsumed or suppressed9 n order for the "vitality and

growth of the text to remain, there must aways be a measure of

the unknown, of the unknowable, of the tobeknown

The only manner n whch a book can be sustained (in its tota

ity) is through the eacement of the text itsef or, more precsely


44/183

Blindness, or What is This No-Thing We See? 27

though the eacement of the potentialiy of the text-for in its

full potentialiy, the text is always fragmented and never allows

for a single reading, for just one reading. This is because every

text relies on language as its medium, and since language is rst

and foremost gurative, it can never be a fully consistent ogica

system: the trope is what allows language to be, but at the same

time is its failing point The trope is the "undecidable statement

within the system, which is that grammar as

tropes are not to e understood aestheticaly as ornament, nor are they understood semantcaly as a gurativemeaning that derves from litera, proper denomnatonRather, the reverse s the case The trope is not a derived,margina or aberrant form of anguage but the ngustic paradigm par exceence. The guratve structure isnot one inguistic mode among others but it characterzesanguage as such20

The trope is what allows a statement to be made-all statements

require comparisons (even somehing as basic as naming some

thing is a transference between the object as such and the object

that is named as such as if the proper of one is the property of

the other), and it is the tro that allows for these transferences

of properties across termsbut is also the failing point of the

same satement, as all transferences are appearances A II state

ments are hinged on the appearance of sameness between the

term and the object as such, or, more precisely, on the appearanceof a link beween language and an exteal referent, and as such,

al that the satement actually fers to is the fact that it is refer

ring Since all of language is an appearance and an illusion, there

is then no metagrounding for any interpretation of a text; each

reading of a text unveils an opinion (or a potentiality) of the text

and never its truth In this way, each reading of the text is always

haunted by the ghost of other readingsther possibilitiesach


45/183

28 READNG BLINDLY

of which is potetiay as true as the rst; the absent readings are

the spectres-the phantomsthat cotiue to disturb the presece

of the rst reading. It is laguage that allows for the positing of

a particular readig of a text, but it is aso anguage that prevents

the tet from comig to a uitary interpretatio from being a

totalizig book.

It is this tesion bewee grammar ad the gure that ensures

that reading is a cotiuous process For, even as gmmar aempts

to suppress gurative language (in order that it can become a com

pete system), it is aways uabe to do so, as it is precisely the

trope that alows laguage to exist i the rst pace.

The sste of reationships that generates the tet andthat fuctions indepedet of its referetia eanig isits grammar. To the extent that a text is grammatica, it isa ogica code or a machie. Ad there ca be o agra

matica tet, as the most ongramatica of poets, Maare was the rst to ackowedge A ongrammaticatext wil awas be read as a deviatio fro a assumedgrammatica norm But just as o tet is coceivabewithout grammar no graar is conceivabe withoutthe suspesion of referetia meaig. Just as o aw caever be written uess one suspends a consderation ofappicabiit to a paricuar etit incuding, of course,oesef, gramatica ogic ca fuction o if its referetia consequeces are disregarded.

On the other hand, no aw is a aw uess it aso appiesto paticuar individuas t caot be e haging i theair, i the abstraction of its generaity. O b thus referrig back to particuar prais ca thejustice of the aw betested, eact as thejustesse of an satemet can on betested b its referetia veiabiit or b deviation fromts ercation. There can be o tet without gramar:the ogic of grammar geerates tets onl i the absenceof referetial meaing, but eve text generates a referet


46/183

Blindness, or W hat is This No -hng We See? 29

h ubv h mmcl pncpl whch wd cnun.21

In h wd w cn cl

text ny ny h cn b cndd fm uch dublppcv: nv pn mndd nn-fnlmmcl ym nd ul ym clod o by

ncndn ncn h ubv h mmclcd whch h x w xnc h "dnonf h x l h mpbly of xnc ndpu h llcl nv f h mpby

A x dnd by h ncy of cndn mn h m m pfomv nd cnvnd h lcl nn bwn u nd mm pd n h mpbly f dnuhn w lnuc funcn whch n ncly cmpb I

m h n x knw wh cnnly c dcpvy nd f x do n c cnn wh knw22

I h nby co h x h nu h d

wy dn nd cnnuy dn; n cn nv cm

hv dy d I h m nbly d x

nd m cm f hvn d h wl n llw nyon o

k lm clm h udn f hvn undd

h x h udn h hy hv undod h x

h u h n nly vy dn lm bu h

pcly h llmcy h low fo dn f h

mpbly f dn cmp dn lf h

nh vy cndn of h pobyh h

pc f dn pc f dn

nc dn umy cp conv nwld of

h d wy dn h bynd oud h


47/183

30 RDING BLNDLY

And if we are attempting to think the possibility of a reading

that is not centred on the self-if we are trying to expore "liter

ature is otherness23 in its fullest sense-then the radical other

ness of literature, of the text must be maintained. The text must

be approached and continually be approached but can never

be reached n order to respond fully to the text one must be

able to respond to the text as other without subsuming the other

under one's conception n other words the text must not merely

become a reection of ones self as that would be merely the

construction of the text in order to react to it a simulated other

to which the self responds to; that would result in a literal cir

cle: the self creating an(other) self-he reader writing another

text-to which (s)he responds nstead of a simulated other the

otheess of the other must be maintained whilst the reader is

reading responding to and with the text: this means that the

text always remains fully other to the self One reads whilst

never claiming to fully comprehend what one is reading At the

moment of reading the reader does not merely process the text

in the sense of obtaining information from the text reading is

responding a negotiation and not an exchange with the text.

eading not a prescribed act-a oneway projection of the

reader onto the text-but a response woway and in full com

munion between the reader and the text (s)he is reading Each

time a text is read there is a response not only to what one can

see-what one knows-but also to the unknown the unknow

abe the phantom(s) in the text For ike phantom imbs just

because they are not so obviously seen does not mean that they

are absent does not mean they have no eects does not mean

they do not aect. ot only do these phantoms the unknown

potentialities allow reading to occur in the rst place-it is

precisely the impreciseness of the gure the trope the hidden

potentialities of language itself that allow for the general rule to


48/183

Blindnes s, or W hat is This No-Thing We See? 31

wok c pcul ul uqu uo lo h

om u d lf c v b lm

ol coc compl l; pom w llow

d o b nd lo u coully conu.

Howv od o xplo bly of d o pod

o d w x posbly of d o x

w mu k o l dou o h o ouh w

v m o pod o o h plc

BLND Enlles, OR CLOSE YOUR VES

(TO) EE THE HIRD

I od o b pobl o mu b bl o ond o

nd of o wou ubum o ud on' co

cpo oh wod o mu o mly bcom

co of o' l would b mly coucoof o od o c o o m: ul ll

ccl muboy ccl lf pod o l

od o v u pobly o mu m

o of o wl pod m

o lwy m fully oh o lf o pod o

d of o whl o fully undd w

vy d A mom of po m of

Hmc' l d dcply mpl forulo"udd w of udd24 lf do o

mly c owd o pod commuc

o Rpobly o pcbd c onwy

pojco of h lf oo ohbu po owy

d full commuo bw lf d o

poblm wh pobly kow po (n

fom of c h pdd) o cond

o of ul of uo h h poblm


49/183

32 REANG BLNDLY

Jacques Lacan points out in Kant avec Sd-in such a case

there is no other tat is respone to as no matter what the situ

ation is the metho is always te same; whilst this oesn't nec

essarily mean that the resulting response is exactly te same, it

oes subsume the situation uner the same conception the same

categoryY In this manner the will of the other is not taken into

account in eect the will of te oter-an te other her or

himselfis eace. A true response to te nees of te other has

to take into account te unique situation that both te self an the

other are in at any moment.

The Levinasian approach to ethics aresses the issue of te

other but ultimately is lacking in response as well not in the

sense of eacing te other but ironically in its attempt to fully

unerstan the oters nees By claiming to privilege the vis

age of the Other" an emptying the self up to te point of becom

ing hostage for the Other what occurs is

an inverte arrogance: as i I am te centre wose existence treatens all oters . confer[ing] on [it a centralposition tis very proibition to assert [the sel makes[it into te neutral meium te place from wic tetrut about the [oter is accessible.26

What happens in this situation is the self absorbs the oter

uner its own categories tere is a total consumption of the

oter More precisely the self simulates the otherthe response

is not to te other but rather to the simulacra of te other Hence

the self is actually responing to its own projecte nees the

other exists but as an imaginary other. Anytime the claim is

mae that the other is centere to the extent that in Levina

sian terms subjectivity is being hostage"27taking the place

of an being a sacrice for te otherven if te intention is to

fully unerstan the other in orer to respon to er or is nees


50/183


what occurs is the disappearance of the other via simulation:another other is created, there is no longer an other. In order fora true response, a full understanding of the other must never beassumed, or even attempted; in this sense, the "visage of theother must always be (at least partially) hidden

This hidden "visage of the other is not merely what SlavojZizek claims when he says, "The true ethical step is one beyond

the face of the other, the one of suspending the hold of the face thechoice against the face for the third28 Zizek's claim is that in privileging the third over the "visage, one is able to have an ethics thatisjust (in the legal sense), for then one can "abstract [the face of theOther] and refocus onto the faceless Thirds in the background29Whilst the Zizekian gesture allows one to perform ajustice (which,in his conception, has to be blind to specics, as in every instanceone can alwaysjusti whatever her or his actions are; for instancepersonal shortcomings such as the failing nature of man), this is anethics which privileges the material situation (he faceless Thirds)whilst eacing the other completely n the sels act of "indierence, what one ds is indeed "suspend one's power of imaginationJ with respect to the other, but what curs instead is that thisimagination is transsed to the "faceless Thirds In this manner,what is curring is a simulation of the "faceess Thirds and theirneeds So whilst escaping the Levinasian trap of simulating theother, the Zizekian gesture merely simulates the "faceless othersndeed, this is not "simply the DerridianKierkegaardian point thatI always betray the Other because tout aue est un autre, because Ihave to make a choice to select who my neighbour is from the massof the Thirds, but is rather a mere reversal of that statement-an" bety the other because refuse to select from the thirds or,even more radically, "I betray both the other and all others becauseI am mely susuming all of you under my conception havemade A of you my absolute other(s)2


51/183

34 REAING BLINDLY

The site of responsibility is indeed the tird, but not as Zizekposits it, for te third exists ot as an exterality to the other(in the form of the faceess oters), but rather i the oter eror himse In responding to and with te needs of te oter,the sef as to communicate wit the other i order to uncoverthese needs. Commuicatio takes pace in the third itself, fortrue communication is not merey te exchage of informatio

(which requires a attening-out of diereceswhic we see inthe Zizekian gesturein order for this exchangeability to takeplace), but rather is a process where te two paries connect andtouch each oter. Communication as Lucretius posits, takesplace in the skin (the simuacrum) between the two parties, andit is in that space tat te two parties negotiate.33 I tis sense,there is no direct transfer of meanig (as posited, for instance,in the ShannonWeaver mode, where every miscommunication

is due to interference and misinterpretatio of codes), but rather,meaning itself is a emergent propery of the process of communication. Tere is no suc tig as miscommunication: communication itsef is an event, and by denition, its result cannotbe predetermied. Respondig to te oter takes pace in tethirdbetween the self and the otherand it is at this site thatthe needs of the other potentialy emerge.

There is no doubt tat there is an exchange tat takes place in

commuicationtherwise, oe will emerge from ay processof commuication competey unchanged (which is not true).Bu the excage that takes place is not oe of a direct infor

mation excange; this would be te ream of a genera excange,an exchange of one unit of informatio for aother This s communication coceived as an economic excage, were a dierencesave to be attened (or abstracted from a use-vaue to an excagevaue), ad perhaps te sense of meaning tat is derived om te

act is, then its surpus value Tis ts in perecty with te logic


52/183


f cpl: cmmuco s pocss s clculbl p

cbl wc pucs suplus vlu us s

cul cycl. A loy of s woul b o of fuu

mo cox c pc of fuu o lo s

m slf( ls of s s pps "D's c wc

Iy c s ) xcp f fc s p of ov

ll s f pcul oom s m c pc

s pfcly subsubl w y o pc; k y cu plc w cs lo s s w

ovll s wll wok fucoly s ky

"mbc of oom s cocp ms

dvul pcs of fuu wc oly v m sof

s b p of wok s oom slf c pc

s vul bu o snul34 cocp of commuco

wc s c xc of fomo c wo

fucos lk pc of fuu oh s m slf s o suly vul wos v m oly

s p of wok of o wos cosucos scs

scs s o Commuco slf woul b sub

sum u fucoly ( s pupos of commuc

woul b pmxc pcul pc of

fomo) s s ly wy wc o c m

mscommuco ook plc oly w m s s c

y flu b m clcul suc cocpof commuco mporc of c pso s m

by pso nwok by xso c ps s

complly uly plcbl xcbl Ec pso

s dvul bu o sul

A pocss of commuco wc s o po m

( by xso o sul) ss o impossible exchange:

xc occus sp of fc s o

f cs35 A mpossbl xc s o lzs


53/183

36 REDING BLINDLY

that there can be no exchange because all logical systems rest

on an exclusion, one that realizes that there is no logical system

that can sustain itself within itself; without the possibility of a

totalizing logica system, there can never be a natural equiva-

lence. Therefore, there can never be any direct exchange except

if the exchange is simuated. This brings us back to Lucretius'

conception of communication: the exchange takes pace in the

simulacra, an exchange that is impossible but which happensnonetheless This exchange in the form of the act of commu

nication, is precisely the emergent property of the process of

communication: communication occurs for the sake of commu

nication and not for some teleological goal There is no overall

"design or "ambience to gove the process of communica

tion; an emergent propey, by strict denition, is unknowable a

priori Hence each act of communication is unique Since there

is no overal structure under which the act of communication issubsumed, there is a potential for a unique and new response in

each act of communication36

It is this incalculability that resides in every pure decision,

where there is, as Jacques Derrida posits, the sacrice of econ

omy, that without which there is no free responsibility or deci

sion.7 It is this incalculability that saves a decision from being

a mere preude to an act The moment of decision is one in which

there is the potential for responding to the other, where the otherremains unknowable (if not totally at least partialy), and in

which one responds with a degree of blindness The blindness

occurs in two realms: one with regards to the other which the self

is responding to (in the sense of not subsuming the other under

the sel; the second to the act that is to be done in response

to the other (in the sense of not knowing a priori what is to be

done). It is this double blindness that allows the self to respond,

in the fullest sense, to the other: not only does every other (one)


54/183

Blindness, or What s This No-Thng We See? 37

[ema] evey (bt) othe"38 the ackowledemet that eveyeco pvlee oe ove all the ema othe, towadwhom we alway ema accoutable, but alo the othe that vlee doe ot become meely a exteo of the elf.

h why Kekeaad poclam, he tat of deco made:9 oe chooe te of the fact that thee o atoal deco to chooe oe coue ove the othe(). If oe wee to

ely olely o loc o atoalty, thee woul alway be a apoetc tuato, but oe ha to chooe pte of th. Othewe,thee a tuato of acto (whch a deco tel thwould be the deco of oepoblty, the efual to epodto the othe ad all the othe othe. h the poblem wthZek' poto by efu to chooe, he ultmately chooe apoto that epod to oe, that abao all the othe. Howeve, f oe chooe to epod, the oe mut eod whlt

be bld (to all othe posblte) t th double bldesthat allow fo the potetalty of a epoe that

a abolute epoblty that could ot be deved foma cocp of epoblty ad theefoe, oe fo t tobe what t mut be t mut ema cocevable, deeduthkable: t mut theefoe be epoble ode tobe abolutely epoble.40

h why Zek clam that the authetc momet, the ealmomet of deco, ha to be oe whch hahne ..utaed by love,41 whch h cocepto a momet of jutcethat s uded by love, a blde delty to the othe h ak to Deda clam that tue epoblty oe

that doet kee accout o ve a accout, ethe toma, to huma, to ocety to oe fellow o to oeow Such a espoblty keep t ecet, t caot ad

ee ot eet telf.t efue to eet telf befoe


55/183

38 READING BLINDLY

the violence that consists of asking for accounts andjustications .42

This is a responsibiity that is blind in and to itsef, in de

ity to responding to the needs of the other Whilst responding

to the needs of the other, the sef and the other remain abso

ute singuarities-this is why there is no economy of exchange

that takes pace The exchange is an impossible exchange: it

is an aeconomica exchange that takes pace This is secret of

the exchange: there is nothing in the exchange except for the

exchange itself This is the secret of the gift there is nothing in

the giving but the giving itsef In a bind responsibiity, one is

responsibe to no one except to the ability to respond; this is

the paradoxical condition of every decision it cannot bededuced from a form of knowedge of which it wouldsimply be the eect, conclusion or explication t structuray breaches knowedge and is thus destined to nonmanifestation a decision is, in the end, always secret43

But in spite of this destiny, in order to respond to the other,

one must respondthis is precisely where the element of bind

ness ies To fuy respond to the needs of the other, one must be

blind to everything else, including the other it is this that alows

the other to remain fuly other whist one responds to her or him

There is no obect to responsibiity.Of course, once the instant of decision has occurred, there

is a consequence which takes the form of the act, aer which

there is an accountabiity to the other and to the other others as

wethis is when eveything is reinscribed into an economy

and one can caculate whether the response was "good or bad

and so on However, this is an economy that is "in simuacrum,

an economy that is ambiguous enough to seem to integrate non

economy44 For in every true response to the other, there is the


56/183

Blindn, or What is Thi No-Thing We See? 39

elemet of the ukowablethe secetthat s bouht to the

act tself: thee s o pekowede of the cosequeces thee

s a potetalty fo a pevously ukow cosequece. Ult

mately "the espose ad hece esposblty always sk what

they caot avod appea to eply amely ecompesead etbuto hey sk the exchae that they mht expct

but ae at the same tme uable to cout o45

t s mpossble to speak of a tue esposby pescptvetems fo that would be mely aothe cateoca mpeatve

that aempts to subsume eve stuato ude ts oc he dou

be bldess that s eve decso (as opposed to mee opto

o alteatve) delty to esposbl s ot a excepto o

a abeat that ca be doe away wtht s a essetal pa of

esposblty tself hs bldess esues that the self espods

to the othe wthout do away wth the otheess of the othe

the radcal oth of the othe ue esposb s ot aaswe but a questo t opes up a space whch oe ca besposble to the othe by be a tue questo (fo whch thee

s o kow aswe at least to the oe ask the questo) ad

as oe happes the call of o fo the questo ad the equest

that echoes thouh t takes us fuhe tha the espose6

It s ths questo esposble to eveyth except espo

sbty tself bld to eveythve the otheexcept the

possb ty of espod to the (ukow) othe that alows boththe othe ad the self to peseve the sulaty espod

to each othe thee s a com toethe that s ak to a

maae the pecse ed of the vow be what God has

joed ma must ot dvde he jo s always mpefect

ad falethewse the vow would have ead ma caotdvde hs suests that ma s fuly capable of dvd the

uo ad t s ths falty that esues that maae s ot a

mee costtutve mee; the two ema fully sula ad the


57/183

40 READING BLNDLY

union depends on the two recognizing its fragility and becoming

one in spite of the impossibiity of doing so. Hence, it is only

though this agreement, this contract, that the union is formed,

that the union has a potentiaity of occurring; in no way does

the contract guarantee that the union wil ast, or even that the

union wil take place: the function of the contract is only to open

up the space for the potentiality of this ve union (perhaps in

compete futility, as it may never even occr in the rst place)In the same vein, the self and the other respond to each other in

spite of the potential futiity of any act to change or mprove the

situation; the self and the other respond with each other in spite

of the impossibility of doing so.

This is a responsibili which is inherently blind, in which blind

ness is a part of its ve structure, a responsibili that closes its

eyes to evething-is blind to evething-except the abii to

respond

a

Since the response of the sef with the other occurs within a

materia reality-that of the situation-we must think about

the ve situation itse More precisely, what must be thought

about are the rues that govern the situation In the case of read

ing, we must, then, rst look at the contract that lies between

the reader and the text and exacty what this entais For it is

not as if anyone reads in a vacuum or is the ve rst to come

to reading; hence, there are rues to reading Just as we are bo

into anguage, we are aso bo into reading And it is these

rules that precede us-both written gramar) and by socia

conventions (interpretation that inuence us and govern how

we read.

However, in order to think these rues, we must take yet another

detour, for how is it possibe to speak of the rues of reading


58/183

Blidess, or W hat is This No-hing We See? 41

cly h wou b k o scb osf whou v

hv ook o mo: l o ds up o s k bo

smu sl I h sm v mp o h s of

whou c oly k pc f o smls h

x o xsc. hs s h pob wh y hoyl s s pscpo of how o wh you ; c

wh os s vh xcp s

LITERARY HEORY AND THE RASlRE OF EXTS

Ay scos o cco fo pscpos sos hm o coclsos of sos o poposos v fo oh poposos whch h l physcl poposos o b hsoy o o

h sol o o socy47

Dsp s clm of y o us xs pscpv ho s p subsu vy x ud mx

y cs bw xs hs m y x

c b s Mxs Lc poscolo o y oh h

oy h o ss hs s du o h fc h v x s subsmd u po cocp(o) h h s comp

cosumpo of h x o h x h s ook z upo

s smu I h cs h s s h sm vyh s

d s f s h sm h. Al uds xs os s oplcs xs s sc

Jus s ll fuu oo s p of wok of s

(h ovll bc) hos cosuc wok

wh whch xs vov ch x css o hv y m

xcp fo s poso wh h ho I o h ol

y (whch s h cosscy o h hoy s s cd h

hoy whch pupos o b h o hk bo h

x s p compy c h vy x o oly os


59/183

42 READING BLINDLY

it not matter that each text is no longer singular, it is so much

jeremy fernando - reading blindly

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