Demosthenes Agrafiotis
Jean-Luc Nancy: A Diagonal Friendship
__________
Notes
[1] The French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy, age 81, died in the evening of Monday, August 23, 2021, He was born in Bordeaux on July 26, 1940. From the end of the 60’s until 2004 he taught philosophy at the University of Strasburg.
Upon the philosopher’s death many pieces were written and catalogs compiled of his more than a hundred books. See for example:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Luc_Nancy
https://www.politeianet.gr/sygrafeas/nancy-jean-luc-29822
https://bookpress.gr/politismos/teleutaia-nea/13965-pethane-o-gallos-filosofos-jean-luc-nancy
https://www.cairn.info/revue-rue-descartes-2006-2-page-86.htm
https://maitron.fr/spip.php?article145672
This text does not refer to the multifarious work of the philosopher; it is simply limited to offering certain moments or events indicative of his multifaceted life.
[2] D. Agrafiotis, , «Πολιτιστικές αβεβαιότητες», Ελληνικά γράμματα Αθήνα, 1995. Pg. 246-276.
The Greek version is presented of my proposal for the Strasburg seminar “Geo-philosophy of Europe” in 1992: «Πως μπορούμε να μιλήσουμε για την Ευρώπη; Τοπο-λογικά, α-τοπήματα». (15-16/05/1992). A new and enlarged version of this text has been published: “Pour l’Europe. Préfigurations t(r)opologiques”, “ rumeurs”, no 9, 06/2021.
[3] Today I would add my debt to Empedocles.
[4] IFA symposium for Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, 10/2008. See my text (based on my oral intervention in the symposium of IFA)
«Η ποιητική του πολιτικού», στο Δ. Αγραφιώτης, Πολιτιστική ποιητική, Ερατώ, Αθήνα, 2012.
The same text was published in French with the title “La poétique du politique” in the magazine La Rumeur Libre, no. 5, 2019. See also the text: D. Agrafiotis, « Périphrases/Paraphrases. Carnet de rencontres », Lignes, no 22, pp 149-153. In the Greek version the text «Περιφράσεις/παραφράσεις. Σημειωματάριο συναντήσεων», στο Δ. Αγραφιώτης, Πολιτιστική ποιητική, Ερατώ, Αθήνα, 2012.
[5] Δ. Αγραφιώτης, «Στα όρια των ορίων», χάρτης 27, 03/2021
https://www.hartismag.gr/hartis-27/diereynhseis/sta-oria-twn-oriwn
[6] Photo by Demosthenes Agrafiotis.
Translated by Angelos Sakkis
Jean-Luc Nancy: A Diagonal Friendship
In the middle of the 70’s, after the suggestion and recommendation of Claude Royet-Journoud (b.1941) and Emmanuel Hocquard (1940-2019), I met, in Strasburg, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe (1940-2007), Claire Nancy (b.1941) and Jean-Luc Nancy (1940-2021) and since then I enjoyed the precious fruit of a deep friendship. During the forty years since, our meetings and interchanges with Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Claire Nancy have remained strong and have become more and more productive. Actual meetings with Jean-Luc Nancy were sporadic but extremely charged with significance. Thanks to Claire Nancy, I have followed the progress of her first husband, as well as their complicated and eventful family life. I had the impression of living the life of the family “Nancy” without having frequent contact with him personally, while I had constant updating about their children and grandchildren for which he always made time and gave generously his attention and care.
With Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, I had the privilege to follow closely, and in a continuous way, his evolution both as a philosopher as well as a “mortal being.” On the contrary, in the case of Jean-Luc Nancy, each time I was in contact with Claire Nancy, one of the recurrent and monotonous questions of mine was: “how is Jean-Luc’s health?” That is, I kept following his course in an irregular, indirect and agonized manner. For decades, some “miracles” kept happening, since each time Jean-Luc Nancy was hospitalized in critical or extremely critical condition, Deus ex Machina would intervene, that is, medical science and practice, and would give a solution to his particular health problem at the time. Jacques Derrida describes his feelings of despair when he was told that his friend Jean-Luc Nancy had been taken to the operation room and the chances of his survival were very low. Indeed, once, he went to visit him at the hospital under the impression that this were to be the last goodbye. Even so, the philosopher and his much-suffering body ran the course of 81 years, and in its last phase, under the constant threat of death [1].
The preceding introduction has a doubtlessly impermissibly personal character. It is necessary, however, to define the place from which some specks of the “tempestuous” life of Jean-Luc Nancy will be given, a life that remained, as all the chroniclers ascertain, far from the current “scandals” of the philosophic stage in France. Also, it must be stressed that our gaze or rather our testimony does not have a philosophic hue but a poetic and cultural one.
In 1992 I had been invited by the two philosophers to their seminar which was focused on the Geopolitics/Geo-philosophy of Europe. I had the opportunity to present my approach for the existence of Europe on the name of its cultural particularity [2]. (A copy of my proposal in French can be found in the archives of the seminar.) The critical question for me was: “can we approach Europe by overcoming a national or nationalistic overview?” My proposal caused the immediate reaction of Jean-Luc Nancy who asked me: “What constitutes your personal Greek point of view and substance?” That seminar had a peculiar structure. Friday evening was dedicated to oral presentation by the invited speaker and the first set of questions, while Saturday morning was structured for a more open dialog. So, I had the entire evening of Friday to prepare my answer. In the meantime, along with all the members of the seminar (except Jean-Luc Nancy), we had dinner at a farm house that was set up as a dining area and we enjoyed the well-known crepes of Alsatia. His question, however, had disconcerted me and deprived me the enjoyment of our frugal meal. The next day I expressed my answer based in the views of Epicurus with a special emphasis on his understanding of clinamen [2], [3]. His own response further on showed somewhat of a surprise, since I had not referred to the dominant philosophical mainstreams (e.g., Platonism) and he pointed out his own searching in regards to clinamen or deviation. I was overcome by a sense of alliance while the questions and opinions of the rest of the seminar members (philosophers, PhD. candidates, undergraduate students, etc.) were piling up and I had to answer them with vigor and clarity. Today I recall that short epicurean moment as intellectual balsam!
I had an equally intense and existential conversation with Jean-Luc Nancy during (but also after) the convention in memory of Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe that took place in Athens in 2008 at the French Institute of Athens (IFA) with the presence of Claire Nancy, Alain Badiou and other philosophers [4]. I had expressed the view that Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe had shown how a philosopher dies at the end of the twentieth century and that we had to look for models in philosophers like Empedocles and Seneca, and then Jean-Luc Nancy added: “in philosophers who finally commit suicide”. The shared finding about the life-course of his friend and colleague in the University of Strasburg evidently had moved him [4]. We had again the opportunity to discuss that during our visit to the archaeologic area of Thorikos, where in 1997 Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe had been impressed by the co-existence of the theater and the mines in Ancient Greece, by the oval shape of the theater and by the (possibly) wooden construction of the stage. He asked me again how I had come to the idea of “slow suicide” for Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe. My answer focused on the events of his life, as well as the dramatic realignments of the philosophic field in France after the appearance of the “new philosophers”, the Sokal scandal and the mechanisms for the production of philosophical teaching [see also the related diagnosis of his friend Jacques Derrida about the French peculiarity in the production of philosophical knowledge and the training of professional philosophers [5]. Jean-Luc Nancy had thought that the personal life-course of “Lacoue” could be seen from that point of view, that is, of the “indirect suicide”, but that constitutes a research subject for his future scholars. The landscape of Thorikos with its theater, the sea, the remainders of the mines, the metallurgy installations and the modern city of Lavrion had cultivated thoughts and feelings that were connected to the quests of Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe in the realm of theater and its beginnings, while, in the case of his friend and colleague, they cultivated (after eleven whole years) the existential question of a philosopher at the end of his life about the perishability of the body and of the cultural models in our internationalized world.
Jean-Luc Nancy had come from a Christian family with strong religious convictions that had showed not only “big words” but also concrete sensibility towards social problems of their times. Himself, and his afterwards wife Claire Matet were members of organization: JEC (Jeunesse Etudiante Chrétienne) in which they have experienced the atmosphere of a radical non-communist movement, and in which they have been exposed to the rhetorics of robust critical thought. That experience of social action (among others) energizes his constant interest about the community (communauté). After period of intellectual adventures [1], finally he has abandoned the Christian political groups and organizations. A second intellectual influence comes from the “quatuor”: Joubert/Theo Frey/Paul Kobish/Nancy which has had tumultuous relations with the Internationale Situationniste-the first of the four thinkers has been expelled from the Intenationale in which Guy Débord has played a key role. However, today it is considered that J-L. Nancy belonged more to non-communist Marxists and less to Situationnists. So, the rising of ’68 gave him an opportunity to put in action some ideas about a new organization of personal and communal life. For an example, he supported a more democratic organization of the University, a greater freedom in the processes of education, and a more open choice of subjects for philosophic research. An outcome of the May ’68 expectations was the fact that the Philosophy Department in Strasburg opened a dialog with Literature (important influence of M.Blanchot), Theater, Music and it acquired the reputation of a truly modernistic laboratory for research and thought – see also the related texts [4] and [5].Finally, the research of the “quatuor” and of the department of Philosophy on the political becoming was centered on the texts of Freud, Heidegger, Marx and Bataille, and the systematic analysis of the phenomenon of fascism per se ,have lead to a series of crucial publications on the question of “political-politikon” . Also, the presence of students from many countries of Europe, Africa and North and Latin America contributed to the creation of a productive internationalist environment in the Philosophy Department. In other words, Jean-Luc Nancy (and his research teams) grappled with the subjects connected to the origination of social and political thought with a full alertness and with high integrity expectations.
In one of my trips to the capital of Alsatia in the framework of the European Network: Science Technology, Society, I found out that there had been a will from the leading group of the University to give a strong boost to the exact sciences and to Engineering. The University of Strasburg has a special history, since, during the German occupation of Alsatia, the institution crossed over to lawlessness and there was an effort to have it operate in an autonomous and independent fashion. This heroic period in the history of the University had been presented as an “exceptional case” during the seminars and workshops of the above-mentioned Network. So, in the decades of ’30 and ’40, there had been a special tradition and an epic atmosphere due to the courage and the bravery of its personnel. Towards the end of the 20th century the University decided to excel in the exact and applied sciences, not only in the theoretical ones, the social and the Humanities. For that reason, the administration thought that the Philosophy Department could become more interested in Epistemology and History of Science and Technology, Philosophy of Science and Applied Ethics in issues of health and the environment. The two responsible professors, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy, had already started (by their initiative)on such a turn in the orientation of the studies and research they managed, that is a turn toward interdisciplinarity, the dialog with the arts and the cultural challenges of our planet. The special interest from the side of the University in sciences and technology was in a strange way accordant with the personal life of Jean-Luc Nancy given that he had started on the great adventure of his survival as a living being: he was alive because the medical science and technology, with their extremely up-to-date and experimental methods, kept intervening on critical organs and biologic systems of his body. Their knowledge of the German language, philosophy and literature, allowed them to function with critical effectiveness right on the geographic and cultural boundaries of the two countries, but that functioning was consistent with the new then ambitions of the University. Doubtlessly the strategy of the Philosophy Department was in sync with the history of the University and was leading toward the desired future. At 2002, with their departure (simultaneous retirement) from active university involvement, a brilliant chapter in the history of the Philosophy Department came to a close. Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Claire Nancy went to Paris while Jean-Luc Nancy with his wife Hélène stayed in Strasburg.
Fifteen years ago, a cinematography crew from France had come to Greece in order to shoot a documentary about Lavrio, more specifically about the ancient mines in the Lavrio peninsula, considered a “technological miracle” – inverted pyramids according to an expression by Dr. Denis Morin – and they had asked me to give an interview about the cultural importance of the ancient installations. The archaeologic area of Thorikos was chosen for a first shoot. The director’s assistant, a young student of multimedia, informed me that she was interested in metallurgy, mines, volcanoes and most definitely in alchemists. Indeed, she informed me that she had taken part in the shooting of a film with a similar subject in the area of Vichy, where the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy had played the part of the Alchemist (and indeed, she showed me parts of the film.) My surprise was great, but just as great was my admiration for his many abilities and his adaptability. Could it be that, after all, Jean-Luc Nancy was nothing but a contemporary alchemist who, instead of searching for elixirs and the transubstantiation of poor metals into gold, had dedicated himself in the unraveling of the problems and mysteries of our times? Could it be that his suffering body had given him all the legitimacy needed to become involved with ways of existence in a world of constant change? Could it be that the introduction of high-innovation products in his body itself allowed him to approach the (Christian) bipolar “body—soul” from the side of his material and, by now, technological being, and instead of a deacon of truth-by-revelation to have become an experimenter of anastochastic/reflexive quest? In any case, he was able finally to illuminate with his own quests and with his texts the multiple dark corners and moments of our times.
With Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, I had the privilege to follow closely, and in a continuous way, his evolution both as a philosopher as well as a “mortal being.” On the contrary, in the case of Jean-Luc Nancy, each time I was in contact with Claire Nancy, one of the recurrent and monotonous questions of mine was: “how is Jean-Luc’s health?” That is, I kept following his course in an irregular, indirect and agonized manner. For decades, some “miracles” kept happening, since each time Jean-Luc Nancy was hospitalized in critical or extremely critical condition, Deus ex Machina would intervene, that is, medical science and practice, and would give a solution to his particular health problem at the time. Jacques Derrida describes his feelings of despair when he was told that his friend Jean-Luc Nancy had been taken to the operation room and the chances of his survival were very low. Indeed, once, he went to visit him at the hospital under the impression that this were to be the last goodbye. Even so, the philosopher and his much-suffering body ran the course of 81 years, and in its last phase, under the constant threat of death [1].
The preceding introduction has a doubtlessly impermissibly personal character. It is necessary, however, to define the place from which some specks of the “tempestuous” life of Jean-Luc Nancy will be given, a life that remained, as all the chroniclers ascertain, far from the current “scandals” of the philosophic stage in France. Also, it must be stressed that our gaze or rather our testimony does not have a philosophic hue but a poetic and cultural one.
I had an equally intense and existential conversation with Jean-Luc Nancy during (but also after) the convention in memory of Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe that took place in Athens in 2008 at the French Institute of Athens (IFA) with the presence of Claire Nancy, Alain Badiou and other philosophers [4]. I had expressed the view that Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe had shown how a philosopher dies at the end of the twentieth century and that we had to look for models in philosophers like Empedocles and Seneca, and then Jean-Luc Nancy added: “in philosophers who finally commit suicide”. The shared finding about the life-course of his friend and colleague in the University of Strasburg evidently had moved him [4]. We had again the opportunity to discuss that during our visit to the archaeologic area of Thorikos, where in 1997 Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe had been impressed by the co-existence of the theater and the mines in Ancient Greece, by the oval shape of the theater and by the (possibly) wooden construction of the stage. He asked me again how I had come to the idea of “slow suicide” for Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe. My answer focused on the events of his life, as well as the dramatic realignments of the philosophic field in France after the appearance of the “new philosophers”, the Sokal scandal and the mechanisms for the production of philosophical teaching [see also the related diagnosis of his friend Jacques Derrida about the French peculiarity in the production of philosophical knowledge and the training of professional philosophers [5]. Jean-Luc Nancy had thought that the personal life-course of “Lacoue” could be seen from that point of view, that is, of the “indirect suicide”, but that constitutes a research subject for his future scholars. The landscape of Thorikos with its theater, the sea, the remainders of the mines, the metallurgy installations and the modern city of Lavrion had cultivated thoughts and feelings that were connected to the quests of Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe in the realm of theater and its beginnings, while, in the case of his friend and colleague, they cultivated (after eleven whole years) the existential question of a philosopher at the end of his life about the perishability of the body and of the cultural models in our internationalized world.
Jean-Luc Nancy had come from a Christian family with strong religious convictions that had showed not only “big words” but also concrete sensibility towards social problems of their times. Himself, and his afterwards wife Claire Matet were members of organization: JEC (Jeunesse Etudiante Chrétienne) in which they have experienced the atmosphere of a radical non-communist movement, and in which they have been exposed to the rhetorics of robust critical thought. That experience of social action (among others) energizes his constant interest about the community (communauté). After period of intellectual adventures [1], finally he has abandoned the Christian political groups and organizations. A second intellectual influence comes from the “quatuor”: Joubert/Theo Frey/Paul Kobish/Nancy which has had tumultuous relations with the Internationale Situationniste-the first of the four thinkers has been expelled from the Intenationale in which Guy Débord has played a key role. However, today it is considered that J-L. Nancy belonged more to non-communist Marxists and less to Situationnists. So, the rising of ’68 gave him an opportunity to put in action some ideas about a new organization of personal and communal life. For an example, he supported a more democratic organization of the University, a greater freedom in the processes of education, and a more open choice of subjects for philosophic research. An outcome of the May ’68 expectations was the fact that the Philosophy Department in Strasburg opened a dialog with Literature (important influence of M.Blanchot), Theater, Music and it acquired the reputation of a truly modernistic laboratory for research and thought – see also the related texts [4] and [5].Finally, the research of the “quatuor” and of the department of Philosophy on the political becoming was centered on the texts of Freud, Heidegger, Marx and Bataille, and the systematic analysis of the phenomenon of fascism per se ,have lead to a series of crucial publications on the question of “political-politikon” . Also, the presence of students from many countries of Europe, Africa and North and Latin America contributed to the creation of a productive internationalist environment in the Philosophy Department. In other words, Jean-Luc Nancy (and his research teams) grappled with the subjects connected to the origination of social and political thought with a full alertness and with high integrity expectations.
In one of my trips to the capital of Alsatia in the framework of the European Network: Science Technology, Society, I found out that there had been a will from the leading group of the University to give a strong boost to the exact sciences and to Engineering. The University of Strasburg has a special history, since, during the German occupation of Alsatia, the institution crossed over to lawlessness and there was an effort to have it operate in an autonomous and independent fashion. This heroic period in the history of the University had been presented as an “exceptional case” during the seminars and workshops of the above-mentioned Network. So, in the decades of ’30 and ’40, there had been a special tradition and an epic atmosphere due to the courage and the bravery of its personnel. Towards the end of the 20th century the University decided to excel in the exact and applied sciences, not only in the theoretical ones, the social and the Humanities. For that reason, the administration thought that the Philosophy Department could become more interested in Epistemology and History of Science and Technology, Philosophy of Science and Applied Ethics in issues of health and the environment. The two responsible professors, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy, had already started (by their initiative)on such a turn in the orientation of the studies and research they managed, that is a turn toward interdisciplinarity, the dialog with the arts and the cultural challenges of our planet. The special interest from the side of the University in sciences and technology was in a strange way accordant with the personal life of Jean-Luc Nancy given that he had started on the great adventure of his survival as a living being: he was alive because the medical science and technology, with their extremely up-to-date and experimental methods, kept intervening on critical organs and biologic systems of his body. Their knowledge of the German language, philosophy and literature, allowed them to function with critical effectiveness right on the geographic and cultural boundaries of the two countries, but that functioning was consistent with the new then ambitions of the University. Doubtlessly the strategy of the Philosophy Department was in sync with the history of the University and was leading toward the desired future. At 2002, with their departure (simultaneous retirement) from active university involvement, a brilliant chapter in the history of the Philosophy Department came to a close. Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Claire Nancy went to Paris while Jean-Luc Nancy with his wife Hélène stayed in Strasburg.
Fifteen years ago, a cinematography crew from France had come to Greece in order to shoot a documentary about Lavrio, more specifically about the ancient mines in the Lavrio peninsula, considered a “technological miracle” – inverted pyramids according to an expression by Dr. Denis Morin – and they had asked me to give an interview about the cultural importance of the ancient installations. The archaeologic area of Thorikos was chosen for a first shoot. The director’s assistant, a young student of multimedia, informed me that she was interested in metallurgy, mines, volcanoes and most definitely in alchemists. Indeed, she informed me that she had taken part in the shooting of a film with a similar subject in the area of Vichy, where the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy had played the part of the Alchemist (and indeed, she showed me parts of the film.) My surprise was great, but just as great was my admiration for his many abilities and his adaptability. Could it be that, after all, Jean-Luc Nancy was nothing but a contemporary alchemist who, instead of searching for elixirs and the transubstantiation of poor metals into gold, had dedicated himself in the unraveling of the problems and mysteries of our times? Could it be that his suffering body had given him all the legitimacy needed to become involved with ways of existence in a world of constant change? Could it be that the introduction of high-innovation products in his body itself allowed him to approach the (Christian) bipolar “body—soul” from the side of his material and, by now, technological being, and instead of a deacon of truth-by-revelation to have become an experimenter of anastochastic/reflexive quest? In any case, he was able finally to illuminate with his own quests and with his texts the multiple dark corners and moments of our times.
 |
| Claire Nancy & Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, Kaisariani, 2002 [6] |
__________
Notes
[1] The French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy, age 81, died in the evening of Monday, August 23, 2021, He was born in Bordeaux on July 26, 1940. From the end of the 60’s until 2004 he taught philosophy at the University of Strasburg.
Upon the philosopher’s death many pieces were written and catalogs compiled of his more than a hundred books. See for example:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Luc_Nancy
https://www.politeianet.gr/sygrafeas/nancy-jean-luc-29822
https://bookpress.gr/politismos/teleutaia-nea/13965-pethane-o-gallos-filosofos-jean-luc-nancy
https://www.cairn.info/revue-rue-descartes-2006-2-page-86.htm
https://maitron.fr/spip.php?article145672
This text does not refer to the multifarious work of the philosopher; it is simply limited to offering certain moments or events indicative of his multifaceted life.
[2] D. Agrafiotis, , «Πολιτιστικές αβεβαιότητες», Ελληνικά γράμματα Αθήνα, 1995. Pg. 246-276.
The Greek version is presented of my proposal for the Strasburg seminar “Geo-philosophy of Europe” in 1992: «Πως μπορούμε να μιλήσουμε για την Ευρώπη; Τοπο-λογικά, α-τοπήματα». (15-16/05/1992). A new and enlarged version of this text has been published: “Pour l’Europe. Préfigurations t(r)opologiques”, “ rumeurs”, no 9, 06/2021.
[3] Today I would add my debt to Empedocles.
[4] IFA symposium for Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, 10/2008. See my text (based on my oral intervention in the symposium of IFA)
«Η ποιητική του πολιτικού», στο Δ. Αγραφιώτης, Πολιτιστική ποιητική, Ερατώ, Αθήνα, 2012.
The same text was published in French with the title “La poétique du politique” in the magazine La Rumeur Libre, no. 5, 2019. See also the text: D. Agrafiotis, « Périphrases/Paraphrases. Carnet de rencontres », Lignes, no 22, pp 149-153. In the Greek version the text «Περιφράσεις/παραφράσεις. Σημειωματάριο συναντήσεων», στο Δ. Αγραφιώτης, Πολιτιστική ποιητική, Ερατώ, Αθήνα, 2012.
[5] Δ. Αγραφιώτης, «Στα όρια των ορίων», χάρτης 27, 03/2021
https://www.hartismag.gr/hartis-27/diereynhseis/sta-oria-twn-oriwn
[6] Photo by Demosthenes Agrafiotis.
Translated by Angelos Sakkis
previous page contents next page
posted by mark young at 9:08 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home