Daniel Heller-Roazen duikt in kwesties van taal, zintuiglijke ervaring en recht binnen diverse literaire tradities. Zijn werk onderzoekt hoe ons begrip van de wereld wordt gevormd door vergetelheid en hoe de essentie van menselijke ervaring voortkomt uit onze omgang met het ongrijpbare. Zijn authentieke stijl kenmerkt zich door scherpe analyses die filosofie, literaire geschiedenis en kritische theorie met elkaar verweven, en lezers nieuwe perspectieven biedt op fundamentele concepten. Heller-Roazens geschriften onthullen diepe verbanden tussen schijnbaar uiteenlopende gebieden van denken en cultuur.
An original, elegant, and far-reaching philosophical inquiry into the sense of being sentient--what it means to feel that one is alive--that draws on philosophical, literary, psychological, and medical accounts from ancient, medieval, and modern cultures
"From missing persons to disenfranchised civil subjects, from individuals tainted with infamy to the dead, Absentees explores the varieties of "nonpersons," human beings all too human, drawing examples, terms and concepts from the archives of European and American literature, legal studies, and the social sciences"--
On the Forgetting of Language
"In Echolalias, Daniel Heller-Roazen reflects on the many forms of linguistic forgetfulness. In twenty-one concise chapters, he moves between classical, medieval, and modern culture, exploring the interrelations of speech, writing, memory, and oblivion. Whether the subject is medieval literature or modern fiction, classical Arabic poetry or the birth of French language, structuralist linguistics or Freud's writings on aphasia, Heller-Roazen considers with precision and insight the forms, effects, and ultimate consequences of the persistence and disappearance of language. In speech, he argues, destruction and construction often prove inseparable. Among speaking communities, the vanishing of one language can mark the emergence of another, and among individuals, the experience of the passing of speech can lie at the origin of literary, philosophical, and artistic creation."--Jacket
An exploration of secret languages, moving among hermetic artificial tongues as diverse as criminal jargons and divine speech.