Memoirs of the Blind

　　In this brilliant essay, Jacques Derrida explores issues of
　　vision, blindness, self-representation, and their relation to
　　drawing, while offering detailed readings of an extraordinary
　　collection of images. Selected by Derrida from the prints
　　and drawings department of the Louvre, the works depict
　　blindness--fictional, historical, and biblical. From Old
　　and New Testament scenes to the myth of Perseus and the
　　Gorgon and the blinding of Polyphemus, Derrida uncovers in
　　these images rich, provocative layers of interpretation.
　　
　　For Derrida drawing is itself blind; as an act rooted in
　　memory and anticipation, drawing necessarily replaces one
　　kind of seeing (direct) with another (mediated). Ultimately,
　　he explains, the very lines which compose any drawing are
　　themselves never fully visible to the viewer since they exist
　　only in a tenuous state of multiple identities: as marks on
　　a page, as indicators of a contour. Lacking a "pure"
　　identity, the lines of a drawing summon the supplement of the
　　word, of verbal discourse, and, in doing so, obscure the
　　visual experience. Consequently, Derrida demonstrates, the
　　very act of depicting a blind person undertakes multiple
　　enactments and statements of blindness and sight.
　　
　　Memoirs of the Blind is both a sophisticated
　　philosophical argument and a series of detailed readings.
　　Derrida provides compelling insights into famous and lesser
　　known works, interweaving analyses of texts--including
　　Diderot's Lettres sur les aveugles, the notion of
　　mnemonic art in Baudelaire's The Painter of Modern
　　Life, and Merleau-Ponty's The Visible and the
　　Invisible. Along with engaging meditations on the history
　　and philosophy of art, Derrida reveals the ways viewers
　　approach philosophical ideas through art, and the ways art
　　enriches philosophical reflection.
　　
　　An exploration of sight, representation, and art,
　　Memoirs of the Blind extends and deepens the
　　meditation on vision and painting presented in Truth and
　　Painting. Readers of Derrida, both new and familiar, will
　　profit from this powerful contribution to the study of the
　　visual arts.
　　
　　

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