Maurice Blanchot vs. Death

“I” die before being born. (Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster, 101)

To think the way one dies: without purpose, without power, without unity, and precisely without “the way.” Whence the effacement of this formulation as soon as it is thought–as soon as it is thought, that is, both on the side of thinking and of dying, in dis-equilibrium, in an excess of meaning and in excess of meaning. No sooner is it thought than it has departed; it is gone, outside.
—-Thinking as dying excludes the “as” of thought, in a manner such that even if we suppress this “as” by paratactic simplification and write: “to think: to die,” it forms an enigma in its absence, a practically unbridgeable space. The un-relation of thinking and dying is also the form of their relation: not that thinking proceeds toward dying, proceeding thus toward its other, but not that it proceeds toward its likeness either. It is thus that “as” acquires the impetuousness of its meaning: neither like nor different, neither other nor same. (Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster, 39)

Presence is only presence at a distance, and this distance is absolute–that is, irreducible; that is, infinite. (Blanchot, Friendship, 218)

My speech is a warning that at this very moment death is loose in the world, that it has suddenly appeared between me, as I speak, and the being I address: it is there between us as the distance that separates us, but this distance is also what prevents us from being separated, because it contains the condition for all understanding. Death alone allows me to grasp what I want to attain; it exists in words as the only way they can have meaning. Without death, everything would sink into absurdity and nothingness. (Blanchot, The Work of Fire, 323-24)

What calls me most radically into question? Not my relation to myself as finite or as the consciousness of being before death or for death, but my presence in the proximity of another who by dying removes himself definitively, to take upon myself another’s death as the only death that concerns me, this is what puts me beside myself, this is the only separation that can open me, in its very impossibility, to the Openness of a community. (Blanchot, The Unavowable Community, 9)

“If it gets finished (the tale), I shall be cured.” This hope is touching in its simplicity. But the tale was not finished. Impotence–that abandon in which the work holds us and where it requires that we descend in the concern for its approach–knows no cure. That death is incurable. The absence that Mallarmé hoped to render pure is not pure. The night is not perfect, it does not welcome, it does not open. It is not the opposite of day–silence, repose, the cessation of tasks. In the night, silence is speech, and there is no repose, for there is no position. There the incessant and the uninterrupted reign–not the certainty of death achieved, but “the eternal torments of Dying.” (Blanchot, The Space of Literature, 118-119)

At first glance, the preoccupation of the writer who writes in order to be able to die is an affront to common sense. It would seem we can be sure of at least one event: it will come without any approach on our part, without our bestirring ourselves at all; yes, it will come. That is true, but at the same time it is not true, and indeed quite possibly it lacks truth altogether. At least it does not have the kind of truth which we feel in the world, which is the measure of our action and of our presence in the world. What makes me disappear from the world cannot find its guarantee there; and thus, in a way, having no guarantee, it is not certain. This explains why no one is linked to death by real certitude. No one is sure of dying. No one doubts death, but no one can think of certain death except doubtfully, the brittleness of the unsure. It is as in order to think authentically upon the certainty of death, we had to let thought sink into doubt and inauthenticity, or yet again as if when we strive to think on death, more than our brain–the very substance and truth of thought itself–were bound to crumble. This in itself indicates that if men in general do not thing about death, if they avoid confronting it, it is doubtless in order to flee death and hide from it, but this escape is possible only because death itself is perpetual flight before death, and because it is the deep of dissimulation. Thus to hide from it is in a certain way to hide in it. (Blanchot, The Space of Literature, 95)

Impossible necessary death; why do these words–and the experience to which they refer (the inexperience)–escape comprehension? Why this collision of mutually exclusive terms? Why efface them by considering them as a fiction peculiar to some particular author? It is only natural. Thought cannot welcome that which it bears within itself and which sustains it, except by forgetting. (Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster, 67)

Yes, let us remember the earliest Hegel. He too, even prior to his “early” philosophy, considered that the two deaths were indissociable, and that only the act of confronting death–not merely of facing it or of exposing oneself to its danger (which is the distinguishing feature of heroic courage), but of entering into its space, of undergoing it as infinite death and also as mere death, “natural death”–could found the sovereignty of masterhood: the mind and its prerogatives. The result was perhaps, absurdly, that the experience which initiates the movement of the dialectic–the experience which none experiences, the experience of death–stopped it right away, and that the entire subsequent process retained a sort of memory of this halt, as if of an aporia which always had still to be accounted for. (Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster, 68)

The “I” that is responsible for others, the I bereft of selfhood, is sheer fragility, through and through on trial. This I without any identity is responsible for him to whom he can give no response; this I must answer in an interrogation where no question is put; he is a question directed to others from whom no answer can be expected either. The Other does not answer. (Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster, 119)

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p.s. Hey. ** David Ehrenstein, Thanks! Oh, wow, I’ll have to get that Warhol museum book. So the ‘Afternoon’ sequence was replaced with Nico because someone/Warhol thought having more of her would be a draw? ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben. Yeah, right? About the prescience. And yes, hats way off to wARC! ** Steve Erickson, No, I don’t believe her full films are online, unfortunately. The great French experimental film center/ distributor has just recently released ‘Bullets for Breakfast’ plus an array of her early films on DVD. Here. I’m an occasional Jarmusch admirer, meaning I quite like some of his films (‘Dead Man’, ‘Zen Dog’, ‘Stranger than Paradise’, ‘Limits of Control’) but feel meh or so-so about more of his films than not. So I’ll probably save the zombie one for an in-flight. ** Misanthrope, Hm, well, my drivers licence expired about 14 years ago, so I don’t have one. I’ll look into whether I’ll need the Real ID thing or not. You’re literally the only person I know who’s even mentioned it. ** Nik, Hi, Nik! Great to see you! Thank you so, so much for the great words about PGL. I’m so happy you liked it. Yeah, that’s music and very heartening, thanks a lot! The connection you see with the gif works makes sense, although I don’t know that I can pinpoint why. I should think about that. But, yeah, that seems sensible. Obviously, there’s a lot of Zac in those films too, as much as there is of me, but people don’t know his work at all, so I think his half of the vision will be something that’s clearer as we make more films. Ah, yes, Sarajevo is getting closer and closer. Very exciting. And I’m glad Blake got back to you and sent work. I feel like his work would sit very well in Conjunctions’ thing, but we’ll see. Mm, I’ll think about other writers to suggest. Me, now: Big meeting tomorrow to hopefully finalise the latest/last(?) draft of the TV series script to send immediately to ARTE. Tentative test shooting of three scenes from the series in the second week of June. Lots of PGL-related stuff going on, screenings and traveling and press and stuff. As for the new ‘haunt’ film, we’re about to get the French translation of the script finished and off to our producer so we can start fundraising. I made a special gif fiction work to be shown (and sold in a limited edition) at Art Basel under the umbrella of Cabinet Gallery, and I’m finalising that. A lot of stuff going on, I guess as usual. All is well and busy with you? It seems so. Take care, man. ** Corey Heiferman, Howdy, Corey. Yeah, the anonymity of deciding committees is always a fright. And I’m like you are, not sure how talkative and particular to be. Generally, as with, say, submitting film proposals for grants, we’ve been advised to kind of mix the personal and specific with the professional and ‘serious’. So, like, my gut says the Starbucks thing is a plus, but I don’t trust my guts on these matters, or not completely. You have trusted friends who’ve aced that situation to advise? No, I don’t eat fish. Someone once described my form of vegetarian as ‘so you don’t eat anything that has as asshole’, and, yeah, that seems to cover it. That must a very nice fish? Bon day, pal. ** Right. Today’s post is probably quite an odd one, but my brain thought it was an idea worth pursuing, and my fingers followed suit. See you tomorrow.