The Space of Literature: A Translation of "L'Espace litteraire" (Paperback)

~ Maurice Blanchot (Author), Ann Smock (Translator, Introduction)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A series of fascinating, and frequently uncanny, meditations."--Year's Work in English Studies. "Authoritative analysis of the creative act... The translator's introduction is as excellent as the translation itself."--Library Journal.

Product Description

Maurice Blanchot, the eminent literary and cultural critic, has had a vast influence on contemporary French writers—among them Jean Paul Sartre and Jacques Derrida. From the 1930s through the present day, his writings have been shaping the international literary consciousness.

The Space of Literature, first published in France in 1955, is central to the development of Blanchot's thought. In it he reflects on literature and the unique demand it makes upon our attention. Thus he explores the process of reading as well as the nature of artistic creativity, all the while considering the relation of the literary work to time, to history, and to death. This book consists not so much in the application of a critical method or the demonstration of a theory of literature as in a patiently deliberate meditation upon the literary experience, informed most notably by studies of Mallarmé, Kafka, Rilke, and Hölderlin. Blanchot's discussions of those writers are among the finest in any language.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 279 pages
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press (December 1, 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080326092X
• ISBN-13: 978-0803260924
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #527,099 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

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29 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Space of Absence, April 5, 2000

By A Customer

Better to read this than to read ten manuals on the subject of writing.

Blanchot evokes the non-presence of death in writing, writing's necessary complicity with death. This death, however, is not the Hegelian death that would negate and finalize the subject (cf Arendt), fixing it in a form on which judgement could finally be passed. No, true to his essay on the absence of any right to death (which appears in _The Work of Fire_ and _The Station Hill Blanchot Reader_), this death never occurs. This death is never present, happens at no particular time, and happens to no one (see also _The Writing of the Disaster_). It cannot be said to happen or occur at all. It is never present, and being so, shares with writing the latter's most unearthly, strange quality - the absense of the writer and of that about which has been written.

In addition to being the most profound book on writing about which I can write with any knowledge, this is also Blanchot's most coherent and accessible set of essays. They possess something of a centrality of purpose and, together, make up something of a book, rather than the collections which make up the remainder of his critical and quasi-critical work. This may be a failing in the eyes of most Blanchotophiles, but it provides a bridge from the normal style of scholarly exposition to his more challenging investigations, and can be recommended as a first approach for the reader who is unfamiliar with his work. Nevertheless, some prior acquaintance with Rilke, Mallarme, Hoelderlin, and Kafka will be of immeasurable aid.

Most importantly, this one stands as its own example of writing that utterly lacks completion, that is haunted throughout with a palpable sensation of absence, a sensation that is at once as appealing as it is astonishing and unsettling.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best Blanchot study, May 1, 2009

By	S. Meimaris (Salamis, Greece) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

A great classic on the subtle workings of the minds of poets and writers and on poetry and writing in general. Like the title aptly puts it, it is a study of the interior space of Literature through studies of great poets like Mallarme, Rilke, Novalis and Holderlin and author-philosophers like Nietzsche and Kafka. Extremely perceptive approach with all the extreme analyses that characterize French thought. Mostly philosophical and intended for Poetry and Philosophy buffs. Excellent translation.