L'absolu littraire: Friedrich Schlegel and the Myth of Irony Author(s): Kevin Newmark Reviewed work(s): Source: MLN,

Vol. 107, No. 5, Comparative Literature (Dec., 1992), pp. 905-930 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2904824 . Accessed: 17/05/2012 22:57
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Friedrich L'absolulitteraire: Schlegel and theMythofIrony

Kevin Newmark

and philosophical The peculiar status of ironywithinthe literary traditionis perhaps best illustrated the potentially by tempestuous questions thatalwaysseem to hoverjust over the head of itsfounder and chiefexemplar, Socrates. Was Socrates a model pedagogue or a seducer and corrupterof innocentyouth?Was his method of rigorous ignorance a path leading to negative knowledge or an abyssal spirallingof rhetoricaltricks?Was his stubborninsistence on interpersonalquestioning and dialogue a formof urbanityor of the egotistical undermining any genuinelysocial,in otherwords, form of community?Was his death sentence an unacpolitical, knowledged confession of moral and intellectualbankruptcyin Greece or a necessarystep in the unfoldingof Western thought? These questions, preciselybecause they will have been repeated there in a way thathas leftan indeliblemark on our own thinking about literature,philosophy, and political history,assume their that is to most acute form in the epoch of German romanticism, of in the constellation textssigned by Schlegel, Hegel, Kierkesay, gaard, and several others. Reading these textsis thereforealways of exactlywhat the quesgoing to entail the difficulty determining tion of irony is about and to what extent such a question can be taken in earnest. For instance: Was FriedrichSchlegel a serious philosopher or a or an mere litterateur, a dilettante, worse,afarceur, intellectual pracPress MLN, 107, (1992): 905-930 ? 1992 by The Johns Hopkins University

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literatebuffoon?Geoffrey ticaljoker, a pretentiously Hartman, in about some of the more controversial a perceptiveessay aspects of once referred to Schlegel as a contemporary literarycriticism, "playboy philosopher," and this prettymuch sums up the way Schlegel has been considered, and dismissed,by real philosophers ever since he received his firstdrubbing at the hands of Hegel.l Whether Hartman himselfmeant it thatway or not, it is the ludic element of "play" that mattershere more than the gender specifiis cationof "boy,"thoughof course sexual difference neverwithout at in its own interestor significance these cases. Primarily issue in mode in which his specuis the non-systematic Schlegel, though, lative writingsrelate to one of philosophy'sprincipal objects and truth.Is ironythe name for a specifickind of philomotivations, sophical truth,say, its masked appearance in more or less playful form; or, is it rather play as sheer dissimulation,deception, and of distortion the truth?This question,because it statesthe issue in in and in thiscase, termsof truthand itsmanifestation a subsidiary, masked form,also serves to remind us that irony is a term that always marks the encounter and potentialtension between literature and philosophy, or truthand tropes. Irony, that is, always seems to confrontus withthe veryserious question of the precise way in which literature'sconstitutivedimension of tropological such as is play,or rhetoric, related to philosophicaldeterminations and truth. meaning, knowledge, Schlegel himself,moreover,went out of his way on more than one occasion to draw attentionto the appeal and even inevitability of such an encounter between literatureand philosophy.One of in formulations thisregard reads: his more laconic and well-known of "The whole history modern poetryis a continuouscommentary on the short text of philosophy: everyart should become science, and every science should become art; poetry and philosophy should be united."2This is all well and good, of course, but as we know-notwithstanding Keats's happy version of this commonplace-such meetingsbetween poetryand philosophy,or between truthand tropes, always run the risk of having theirconstituents rub each other the wrong way. The solicitationof literatureby to philosophycan alwaysbecome a simple invitation trouble,as the if it is not taken seriouslyenough, or, as saying goes, especially seems to be the case withFriedrichSchlegel, is taken far too serithis ously. Anotherof his fragments, one published posthumously, just happens to read: "Critique of Philosophy = Philologyof Phi-

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losophy,thatis one and the same.-Since philosophyhas criticized under the so verymuch, in facthas criticized just about everything itself" sun, it certainlyought to be able to stand a littlecriticism 228, KA 18:40).3 And so it is perhaps high Fragment (Philosophical time to subject philosophical truth to a critique by philology or or at literature, least a little, a littlebit playfully. The basic contours of such a critique can be conveniently provided by way of several remarks made by Philippe Lacoueand Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy in theirmagisterial presentation analysis of the relation between literatureand philosophyas it is L'absolulitteraire.4 articulatedin German romanticism, Unquestionin ably one of the most vigilantand successfulefforts recentyears of philosophyto criticizeitselfby takingup the challenge of literoffersperhaps the best example bywhichto ature,L'absolulitteraire approach the enigmatic place occupied withinGerman romanticism by Friedrich Schlegel and his irony.Thus, Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy state veryclearlyand rightfromthe startof theirpresentation: that for be that It is imperative [romanticism] accounted philosophically, for withthe philosophical it be articulated itself, in its fundamental provenance and consequences, it is philosophical through and is (or comprehensible even acthrough.... [R]omanticism rigorously basis,in itsproperand in factunique cessible) onlyon a philosophical with (in other words, new)articulation thephilosophical....If entirely it in romanticismapproachable, other is words, is approachable onlyby .... (28-9) meansof the'philosophical path' As thingsturn out, however, Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy immediatelyrecognizethatthe philosophicalpath invokedhere willhave as well to negotiate the "eruption," or interruption,produced inalong its lengthby "the question of literature":"[romanticism] withinthe philosophical,a distance fromthe philosophtroduces, et and a deviation(unedistortionun ecartement)" (29). ical, a distortion it not also be true that this distortion,this deviation, or Might path of philosophyalso turningaside fromthe otherwisestraight albeit by the roundabout figureof periphrasis,the erupnames, of tion,or interruption, ironywithinromanticism? In an all-too familiar posthumous fragment,Schlegel himself underscored the relationbetween ironyand the sudden eruption the thatserves to disruptor interrupt movementof a straight line, it to the dramaticprocedure wherebythe chorus interby linking

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rupts and intervenesin the sequential unfoldingof a Greek tragedy: "Irony," Schlegel once wrote, "is a permanent parabasis" 668, KA 18:85).5 But to judge fromthe exFragment (Philosophical plicit references by Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy in L'absolu lita teraire, "irony"does not constitute major crux of theirargument about the kind of deviationintroducedinto the philosophicalpath nor do theydevote to the termirony, by the question of literature, as they do to the romantictheorizingof "fragments," "religion," a commen"poetry,"and "criticism," sustained and differentiated tary.6 It could be, of course, thatLacoue-Labarthe and Nancy are simply taking at face value-always a questionable maneuver when "irony" is in the offing-suggestions made by the two German criticswho have most influenced the writingof L'absolu litteraire, The Walter Benjamin and Peter Szondi. In his dissertation, Concept in Benjamin points out that of Art Criticism GermanRomanticism, logical force,"had the Schlegel,partlybecause he lacked "sufficient names for his systematic different confusinghabit of substituting if useless to attemptto find concepts,makingit difficult not finally in his writings clear definitionof termslike "irony."7And Peter a on Szondi is even more straightforward this point. In an essay and Romantic Irony," which Lacouecalled, "Friedrich Schlegel withand cite,Szondi, veryclose to Labarthe and Nancy are familiar has thissurprising commentto of his discussionof "irony," the end make: "So far we have sought to discover the presuppositionsof and without to romantic irony without namingtheconcept attempting it. For it was our hope that in this way we mightresist the define to Irony, temptation whichso many scholarshave succumbed.... itseems, at least forthe properlyphilosophicaldiscourse,is a temptation to be resisted,and is best writtenabout when it is neither "named" nor "defined." As a grounding principle for a general idea to theoryof hermeneutics,this would be a very interesting more germane to the point at hand would be to pursue; however, ask the followingquestion of L'absolu litteraire: What, precisely, when happens to a reading of Schlegel and German romanticism the ironic dimension of their legacy to modernityis not tackled to What happens, thatis, when the temptation name and directly? manner is literalizedand ultimately define ironyin a truly rigorous resisted? In order to suggesta possible response to thisquestion,it willbe helpfulto examine in some detail how Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy

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eventually deploy the fundamental and invaluable insight their philosophical treatmentof romanticismenables them to reach. What finallysets L'absolu litteraire apart from almost every other is of German romanticism the recognitionthat,prior to any study determinationof either the specificallyliteraryor philosophical relation between phielement withinit, it must be the constitutive thathas to become an object of criticalanallosophy and literature Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy ysisin its own right."Romanticism," thereforeremind us, "is neithermere 'literature'. . . nor simplya as or, itself literature in 'theoryof literature'.. . . Rather,it is theory other words, literatureproducing itselfas it produces its own theis more liable ory"(12). But perhaps thisindispensableinsight itself and repetition) than to formalization to formulation (and therefore criticalanalysis and understanding.What, precisely,does it mean for literatureand philosophy when literaturebegins to produce itselfas it produces its own theory,which is to say, when theory assumes the necessaryburden of itsbeing at one and the same time "literary." does notmean, insistLacoue-Labarthe and One thingit certainly should be led astrayby the "ratherfeeble" point Nancy, is thatwe of view adopted by Mme de Stael on the relationof literatureand philosophy in German romanticism.Mme de Stael, who in this respecthelped to found whatLacoue-Labarthe and Nancy also call on a long traditionof "ignorance" and "criticalunintelligence" the wondered if great writers"needed metaphysics"to be subject, great, and eventuallybecame a bit impatientwith "philosophical It applied to literature."9 is thisimpatiencewiththe philosystems of romantic literaturethat Lacoue-Labarthe and sophical aspect witha refusalto read the textsin question, Nancy finallyidentify and that theycharacterizeas Mme de Stael's typical"resistanceto au (12-3). Only by fully recognizing theory-resistance theorique" as is that romanticism "theory or, itself literature in other words, litwould it be erature producing itselfas it produces itsown theory," to come into contactwiththe absolulitteraire which Laby possible characterizeSchlegel and the rocoue-Labarthe and Nancy rightly manticismhe helped to articulate. But would it then sufficeto suggest,along withLacoue-Labarthe and Nancy, that such a forabsolute that is simultaneously mula for the literary absolutelylitis also equivalent to the philosophico-literary program anerary nounced in Lyceum 115, whichquite simplycalls for "poFragment withoutfurther ado? etryand philosophyto be united (vereinigt)"

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And if, as a resultof acknowledgingthis reciprocalideal of unity it and theory, were possible to overcome foronce the forliterature resistanceto theorypracticedby Mme de Stael kind of superficial and her academic heritage,would it then follow that a book like could itselfcomplete the "properly L'absolu litteraire philosophical of romanticism" (13) it in facthelps to initiate? study Certain "literarytheoreticians,"not that distant from LacoueLabarthe and Nancy in terms of their textual interestsand apto proach, have pointed to a kind of "resistance theory"thatcannot be overcomeonce and forall byan act of critical recognition simply and vigilance on the part of the philosophical commentatorof on literature.At issue, for instance,in Paul de Man's writings the relation between literatureand theoryis the peculiar suggestion or that,beyond the necessarilytheoretical, philosophical,vigilance for any genuine reading of a literary text,there stillrerequired mains an obstacle to the criticalanalysis and understandingthat such vigilancecould alone make possible. "Nothing,"de Man says with a bit of irony of his own, "can overcome the resistance to theorysince theoryis itselfthis resistance."'0 What can de Man resistance to theory, mean when he says that this self-reflexive which he also calls a "resistanceto reading," cannotbe overcome? of would the impossibility overwhat specificeffects And, further, the resistanceto theoryhave on a "properlyphilosophical" coming reading of FriedrichSchlegel? absolulitteraire On the one hand, and verymuch like the romantic named and theorized by Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy, de Man's model of literary theorycan be said to be neithermere literature but is rather made up of both nor simplya theoryof literature, and literatureat once. For de Man, then, literarytheory theory refers to boththe rhetorical awareness, sometimes called "close dimension linguistic reading," that allows access to the specifically of transformation of constitutive any textas textand the systematic thisdimension into a universallogic of philosophicalmeaning and truth. Literary theory,for de Man as for Friedrich Schlegel, is own productionof an absolute literatureas theory;it is literature's at the same timethatit reproduces itselfabsolutely.But on theory to the other hand, and in ever so slightcontradistinction LacoueLabarthe's and Nancy's avowed project of achieving a properly philosophicaldescriptionand understandingof thisabsolulitteraire, of structure of theorization the literary it is preciselythe systematic text whatsoever that de Man says is always and necessarily any

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"resisted"in a way that nothingcould hope to overcome. Accordof ing to de Man, the actual specificity the literary,figural,or ultimately,rhetorical,element in the text is what always resists the theoreticaland philosophicalsystematization. And, conversely, necessarilysystematic aspect of all theoreticalexposition is what eventuallythreatensto erase any given literary specificity transby posing it into a generalizable law of philosophy. It is in this very particularsense-and not as a result of some will to paradox or obfuscation-that de Man's resistancecan be said to be a built-in of constituent "literary theory."Schlegel himselfhad already said somethingquite similarabout the resistanceto theoryin literature, it'sjust that we usually resist reading that as well: "It is equally deadly for the mind to have a systemas not to have one. So we'll 53, just have to learn to combine the two" (Athenaeum Fragment KA 2:173). Taken in conjunction, the two terms of the textual relation-literature/theory, systematic/non-systematic, poetry/ they philosophy,like the absolulitteraire disclose,moreover-always designate a necessaryphilosophical task whose ultimatepossibility is radicallysuspended by the verynature of its literary object. If it is true, then, that romanticismnames the moment when then it must as literature produces itself it produces itsown theory, be grantedby the same token thatno genuine access could ever be had to this moment by economizing on either the systematically rhetoricaldimension that by definitheoreticalor the specifically To in tion resisteachother theirmutual productionof romanticism. the extent that any analysis aims at and can actually achieve a it "properlyphilosophical" expositionof romanticism, would necin a systematic avoidance of the very literarydiessarilyengage mension it setsout to document and understand.By an ironictwist that at this point would have verylittleto do withsubjectivemasabsolu teryor caprice, the theoreticalresistanceto romanticism's would be most redoubtable precisely at the moment it litteraire distortionand undoing of the claimed to describe the systematic discourse actuallybroughtabout by romanticliteraphilosophical ture. What now remains to be determinedwithsomewhatmore preor cision is what an absolutely"literary theoretical," "systematically would consistin of Schlegel's romanticism nonsystematic" reading to a theoretical reductionof the were it not to fallimmediately prey elementscomprisingits object of analysis.Such a determiliterary nation could not itselfbe reduced to a mere descriptionof literary

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theorybut would have to include an actual example of the literary also resistsbeing-fully element that is to be-but that ultimately theorized. But how do we actuallygivea literary example without it, representingit, and thus resistingit philomerely describing sophically?ll The question brings us back to Lacoue-Labarthe's and Nancy's philosophical descriptionand understandingof the "romanticgenre par excellence,the fragment" (40). The fragment it the philosophicallogic of romanticism servesboth to exemplifies constituteand to interrupt,or fragment.Lacoue-Labarthe and stands for itself Nancy themselvesgloss thislogic: "Each fragment and for that from which it is detached. Totality is the fragment itselfin its completed individuality" (44). And thisremarkleads to a recognitionin the same paragraph that "fragmentsare definiare tions of the fragment."In other words,fragments both examples of particular fragments(literature)as well as formalizeddeof in scriptions the fragment general (theory).Now thisrecognition to leads, in L'absolulitteraire, a certaintension.On the one hand, the totalizingtendencyof the logic of the fragment-simultaneously literaryfragmentand theoreticaldefinitionof the fragment-is clearlydistinguishedfromwhat the authors understand to be the effectof more contemporary examples of literary "disseminating" to theory. Unlike the "writing"referredspecifically Blanchot or far Derrida, then, "the romanticfragment, frombringingthe disof persion or the shattering the workinto play,inscribesits pluralwork ... Fragmentationis ityas the exergue of the total,infinite not, then, a dissemination..." (48, 49). On the other hand, roof manticismnever seems quite able to achieve the totalization the absolute it representsto itselfin the formof the fragment. literary It turns out, then, that the otherwisefertilepluralityof the fragafterall: "Withinthe romanticwork, ment mightbe disseminating and disseminationof the romanticwork.... there is interruption itselfat the same point" (57). the fragmentcloses and interrupts If we go on to ask where,exactly, thisdisseminating characterof the literaryfragmentwould begin to manifestitselfin a way that or would no longer be theoretically philosophically totalizable,we in L'absolulitteraire: "thereis intermeet withthe following enigma ruption and disseminationof the romanticwork, though this in even and especiallyby privifact is not readablein the work itself, the fragment..." (57). What can Lacoue-Labarthe and leging that Nancy mean when they say that the radical fragmentation traversesand underminesthe totalizinglogic of romantic actually

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or writingis not "readable" in the fragmentitself, on the level of mean that theythemselvesnever the fragment?It may ultimately principleof semanticcoherencygoverning question the underlying theoryof litany properlyphilosophical reading of romanticism's determination to erature. And this fidelity a principleof semantic is in factreadable in the way Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy, despite of and their unerringtheoreticalformulations the disarticulating of the example, stillconceive the actual writing disseminating logic and reading of the romanticfragmenton the basis of a logic of That is, they ground their own readings of Schlegel's mimesis. and be intellito in fragments the capacityof such writing signify and finallyselfeven if multiplicitous gible in an unproblematic, contradictory, way. For the romantics,according to L'absolu litteraire, fragmentary writingis not just an effectof happenstance, it is "a determinate the thatassumes or transfigures accidenand deliberate statement As such, the tal and involuntaryaspects of fragmentation" (41). also becomes "the verymethod . .. suitable for romanticfragment the statement access to the truth"(45). Taken together, fragment's of constitute mimologics truth:"The a and method would therefore expositioncannot unfold on the basis of a principleor foundation because the 'foundation' fragmentation presupposes consistspreThe fragment in its organicity. in the fragmentary totality, cisely conceivable for the the thus constitutes most 'mimological'writing individual's organicity"(44). Because the truthof the individual romanticworkor subject mustbe formedthroughan infinite process of auto-production,the ultimateformof the subject or work of can be given onlyin a fragment the necessarilyincompleteand at whichit alwaysaims.12In thisway,the motif progressivetotality on would respond to and even mirror, the level of the "fragment" the of its incompleteformalarticulation, philosophicalmeaning of incompletionit is alwaysalready orientedtoward.Followinga path Lacouetraced out by Gerard Genette in his book, Mimologiques,13 fortheirunderstandingof the Labarthe and Nancy ultimately rely and on romanticfragment just such a mimeticprincipleof identity if this understandingeventuallyleads to a theoretanalogy-even ical statementof its own collapse and dissolution. Is it not because Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy never actually question theirown capacityto read and understand the romantic principle of fragmentaccording to a mimologically-determined or that they must insistthe dissemination, radical intermeaning

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ruption,of philosophical speculation engaged in our own day by like Blanchot and Derrida is notreadable on the level of the writers romanticfragment?Is this not also the reason theycan go on to and disseminationof make a furtherclaim: "there is interruption the romanticwork,though thisin factis not readable in the work itself.... Rather,accordingto anothertermof Blanchot,it is readnevernamed,and still less able in the unworking (desoeuvrement), of that insinuatesitselfthroughoutthe interstices the rothought, An entirely correcttheoretical manticwork"(57, emphasis added)? that there is somethingin the romanticproject of the statement, a of thatexceeds and radicallyinterrupts thinking idenfragment leads to a conclusion the mediation of non-identity, titythrough thatgoes and a reading practicewithrespectto the textsthemselves counter to the literarytruthof the very same statement. entirely For it remains to be seen whetherit is not preciselyat the level of the literaryexamples deployed in and around the act of naming could be said to inscribea textual interrupthat romanticwriting itselfat everypoint,and thistimebeyond the reach tion exceeding of any theoreticalformulation.In this case, irony mightjust turn so out to be one of the most rigorouswaysto name a "readability" thatitwould necessarily remain formulation to resistant theoretical hidden or dissimulatedwithrespectto any properlyphilosophical understandingof Schlegel's text. Such a dissimulated readability,moreover, can be traced in Schlegel's text wheneverit confrontsthe perplexing power of the name, as it does, for instance,in his "Discourse on Mythology," where the issue in question is the romanticproduction of a "new This slogan has become as well known,one might mythology."'4 almost say notorious, as anythingelse Schlegel ever wrote: "We he have no mythology," says at the beginningof the text;"but,"he "we are close to getting one, or rather,it is high adds, immediately time we set to work togetherto produce one" (81). And this of course, is where the question of romantic"literary theory"takes a and dramaticturntowardmore compellingissues,such surprising as history and politics.For it does not take an overlyactive imagito on the contrary, see that the question of this "new mynation, called for by Schlegel at Jena in 1800 is not just an aesthology" thetic-that is, formaland epistemological-ideal. Rather,as both Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy have subsequentlyhelped to demonstratewith a great deal of intelligenceand force,the German roon cannotbe separated fromitsprofound manticreflection "myth"

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implicationin aesthetic,philosophical,and politicaldevelopments and sometimeswiththe century, extendingwell into the twentieth most disastrousconsequences. In this respect it is highlysignificant that the presentationand in of the Schlegelian strandof German romanticism L'abanalyses are solu litteraire followed in 1986 by the publicationof Jean-Luc and desoeuvree, in 1987 by the publication Nancy's La Communaute of Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe's La Fiction politique: du I'art Heidegger, both of whichcan be read as naturalextensionsof the etla politique, earlier project into the domain of twentieth-century thoughtand all these works together helps to situate the politics.l5 Reading withinthe largercontextof our own eventof German romanticism the seminal place occuand to identify waning twentieth-century of withinit by the writings FriedrichSchlegel. An attentive pied reading of the penetrating analyses and reflectionsof LacoueLabarthe and Nancy on the inextricabletie between art, philosophy, and politics, moreover, makes it extremelydifficultif not but impossibleto considerSchlegel'sauthorshipas a brilliant finally and dated contributionto nineteenth-century aesidiosyncratic is theticphilosophy.If German romanticism to be taken seriously, then it must be understood in termsof its historicaland political as and theoreticalsuramifications well as in termsof its literary And this also means that we must be willingto conperstructure. of frontSchlegel's model of the absolulitteraire, literatureproducitselfas it produces its own theory,withthe fatefultransposiing tion of this model in twentieth-century Germany to a total and and politics.The formalmodel of autovision of history totalizing production Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy trace back, in L'absolu litis to teraire, early German romanticism thus shown by their later work to be coterminouswitha politicalmodel of auto-production of that eventually made common cause with the totalitarianism National Socialism in the 1930s. as "Auto-production" it is used by Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy is to be understood in termsof an all-encompassingmodel of autoproduction of an estheticBild, or poiesis. It is the self-forming as well as a social Bildung,or cultural matrixin which all image, such images, including the production of the quotidian itself, would always have their appointed place. The resultingspecular relationshipbetween both concrete formsand intellectualor spirof itual developmentensuresbythe same tokenthe ultimate identity to and State in contradistinction any elementsthat self,community,

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would remain recalcitrant thismimetological to Thus, the identity. wordfiction the titleof Lacoue-Labarthe's book on art and polin itics designates the originaryoperation of making, inventing,or fashioning,prior to its furtherimplicationin epistemologicaldeof terminations truthand falsehood. For thisreason too, the artof will eventhat,according to La Fictiondu politique, self-fashioning tuallygovernthe entireNazi model is dubbed byLacoue-Labarthe, "national aestheticism."By tracingout in this book the brief but significantalignment in 1933-1934 of Heidegger's thought with the actual politicalphilosophyof the Nazis, Lacoue-Labarthe is able and nationalism, to delineate theircommon strandsof aestheticism whichalso allows him to point out that,in the finalanalysis,such a of consisconfiguration art, politics,and philosophyis thoroughly tent with a much older model "that would be impossible not to identifywith the romanticmodel developed at Jena" (La Fiction, 29). And as if this referenceto the romanticmodel developed at he Jena were not clear enough in itself, immediately specifiesit by it directlyto Schlegel's celebrated call for "a 'new mythollinking by ogy.' " This formulation Lacoue-Labarthe of the common ideal of a "new mythology" shared, howeverdistinctively, Heidegger, by of National Socialism, and the Jena romanticism FriedrichSchlegel, moreover,orientsa number of the book's most incisiveanalycan be conveniently ses.16 The overall movementof thisorientation froma remarkLacoue-Labarthe makes near the middle of gauged La Fictiondu politique. Summarizing the central motifs-art, lanconstituteHeidegger's conception of History guage, myth-that (and as a result, his politics), Lacoue-Labarthe anchors them in what he calls "a longstandingGerman traditionthat originatedin theJena of Schiller(and not of Goethe)-the Schlegel brothersand H6lderlin, Schellingand to some extentthe 'young Hegel' " (87-8). And he takes thisremarkone further step when he adds thatthis "tradition"-for all intents and purposes, the "romantic" particular traditionincludingSchlegel,but also passing throughWagner and on Nietzsche-"finallyimposed itself and dominatedunder various the Germanythatwas unresistant the 'movement'of the to aspects thirties" (88-9). Now it is certainlypossible that Lacoue-Labarthe, while loosely associating in this way the thought of Jena romanticismwith a broad traditionof "national aestheticism" unresistant to ultimately the actual factof National Socialism in Germany,is notsuggesting thatall the proper names implicatedin thiscontextcan be read and

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understood in the same reductiveway with respect to twentiethcentury ideology and history.The inclusion here of the name, Holderlin, in fact, should give us immediate pause, since both Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy have on a number of occasions gone between Holderlin's poetics and the out of theirway to distinguish "main stream" of German romanticliterary theory.Even the refis erence to a "new mythology" not necessarilymeant to designate also ocFriedrichSchlegel alone. For the term,"new mythology," in curs, and well before The Dialogue on Poetry, the textcalled the of "Earliest System-Program German Idealism," an anonymous is text usually attributedto Schelling and in which mythology indeed associated withan "eternalunity"eventually capable of idenand developing all the forces and historicaldestinyof a tifying given "people."'7 Schelling,as we know,did have a lot in common with the Schlegels, but that does not mean he shared everything withthem,nor that he did or thoughtor wrotethe same thingsto exactlythe same degree. The question here is not to document the general fate of the concept of mythafter the "Earliest Systemof Program" or even afterSchelling'slectureson the Philosophy Art of first all in this or his Philosophy Mythology. Rather,whatmatters of particularcontextis to testwhetherand to whatextenta reading of and of the necessary Schlegel's own "Discourse on Mythology," in it of his theoryof irony,can in factbe called "resisimplication tant" with respect to a "tradition"leading backwards to Schelling and Schiller and forwardsto Wagner and other ideologues of naof tional aestheticism.18 The proximity Schlegel's textto the motifs withwhichwe have become in the meanof all the new mythologies time only too familiaris obvious and massive. It cannot simplybe overlooked or discounted.But, on the otherhand, the stakesof the discussion-political and historicalnow as well as merelyliterary and philosophical-are enormous. They are certainlyimposing enough to warranta return to Schlegel's text before subscribing once and for all to the commonplace that the "'Discourse on Mya thology' . . . is virtually pure distillateof Schelling" (L'absolulitteraire, 93). concernsthe possibility As is well known,Schlegel's new mythology of givinga name and a formto the highestof powers,the productive power or force of poetry itself."Are the most sacred things the and formless," discourse begins by always to remain nameless

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asking,"and will theybe leftin darkness to chance (imDunkeldem Zufall)?"(81) This question of the name, whichgoes hand in hand here withthe question of form,or formation (Bild and Bildung),as rhewell as withthe darkness of chance, is not, however,entirely torical. Or, rather,if it is rhetorical,it would be so in a way that could not be easily reduced to theoreticalexposition and understanding. For, despite the apparent resolutionin the talk on mythologythatfollows,thisquestion is introducedas a challenge or a zu Euch selbst summons to ask questions ("willichEuch auffordern, And once the questioningattitudeis perceived in all of its fragen"). intothe "Disa radicality, quite unexpected answerinsinuatesitself course": "If what is highest,the Ideal, is in factnot susceptibleto determinateformation(absichtlichen Bildung),then let us give up claim to a free art of ideas, which would then be merelyan any emptyname"(86). In other words,Schlegel's textstakesthe entire and this free art of ideas (freie Ideenkunst) project of romanticism, and theory, thatwould once again coordinateliterature poetryand of on the possibility a kind of naming that would siphilosophy, But withthe be multaneously a determinateformand a formation. same gesturehis textalso names a threatimmediately posed to very of a kind of the project bythe name, thatis, the further possibility would remain curinaming whose relationto formand formation In indeterminable. otherwords,the originary power to name ously musthave a name, but thisname on whichall else restsmightitself or remain a pure accident,that is, unabsichtlich zufallig. Of course, it can always be argued that the reference at this particular moment to the "empty name" is itselfgratuitousand and thereforecould have absolutelynothingwhatunintentional, soever to do withthe text'soriginalquestion of givinga name and a form to poetic force. The second referenceto the name could thus be a mere accident withinthe contextof the essay taken as a the the whole. But thenitis precisely challengeof determining very between statusof the name on the basis of the necessarydistinction that is at issue here in the accident (Zufall) and intention(Absicht) This kind of accident,then, the formationof a new mythology.19 the textualslip thattransforms challenge of the "namelessart" into the radical threatof an "emptyname," far fromresolvingthe tension, exacerbates it even further. At this point, moreover,the second referenceto the name, this the text'sown movetime empty,actuallydoes serve to interrupt decision about the concernsa grammatical ment.The interruption

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statusof the example now given fora "freeart of ideas." That is, it of the possibility our understandingwithouthesitation interrupts around which the entire the very particular name, "Mythology," discourse is organized. "If whatis highestof all is in factsusceptible "thenlet to no determinateformation whatsoever," Schlegel writes, whichwould us give up any claim to a freeart of ideas (Ideenkunst), is then merelybe an emptyname. Mythologysuch a workof art. .." then,is the exemplaryname for (86, emphasis added). Mythology, a free art of ideas, and thatmuch at least is abundantlyclear. But whether the form and formationof this name for a free art of determinedaccording could itself ever be fully ideas, "mythology," or to a logic of intention of accidentis not to be decided lightly. Just an whatis mythology example of here? In otherwords,determined only by the demonstrativequalification,"sucha work," does mythologyhave as its grammaticalantecedentthe promise of "determinate formation"or the threatof the "emptyname"? Is mythology the name as determinateformfor all poetic force,and therefore a substantial and free art of ideas in its own right; or is an mythology art of ideas only insofaras it is actuallynothingbut an emptyname (in whichcase we would do well to give up making any importantclaims on it-philosophical much less political)? According to one of the oldest and most powerfulof philosophor ical distinctions, Schlegel,wittingly not,thus places the question withina highlyvolatile relation. On the of romantic"mythology" one hand, mythologynames a mode of historicaland collective and knowledge; but on the other hand, mythology autoformation also designates a mere tool of deception or self-deception that,as and ideology, can have no claim the very stuffof mystification to Mythhas the legitimacy. (Anspruch) epistemologicalor historical or to fashion;but does itfashionself-identity self-deception? power As we have seen, the grammarof Schlegel's text,at thisparticular point in any case, does not allow us to decide the outcome of this tension in favor of one of its two sides over the other. At least it does not do so withoutobligatingus to have recourse to a kind of of over the formation meaning that or authorial intention, Absicht, is the very point of contention,and thus foreclosed,in the text itself.There can as yet be no question of saying Schlegel actually meant thisbut rathersaid that; nor can we safelyassume thatthis or that aspect of the writingrepresents the "thought" or "unthought"portion of his discourse. Rather, we could say that it is preciselythis dilemma that is named in Schlegel's writingby the

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extended It word "mythology." could thereforeonly be by a more reading of how the textactuallyinitiatesand develops the formation of thisparticularexample-mythology as the name for"sucha work of art"-that we mightever hope to approach thistext with anythinglike the criticalrigor necessaryfor Schlegel to writeit in the firstplace. The "Discourse on Mythology" opens on the oppositionbetween poetry and knowledge, individual activityand universal underwillalso standing.Throughout the Dialogue in fact,thisdistinction to the assumption of a historically determinable correspond will as schema in whichantiquity, an age of pre-reflective harmony, and divisionthat, as be opposed to modernity, an age of negativity so far at least, has been unable to produce anythingbut isolated momentsof poetic and philosophicalachievement.The argument of Ludovico, the speaker in the "Discourse on Mythology,"responds once again to the received opinion that the modern age must learn to demonstrateitscapacityto unite the two antithetical and theoreticalorganizationinto a tendencies of poetic creativity unless workscan be produced in whichthe spehigher unity.For, cifically poetic force of each new creation is also provided witha firmbasis, there can be no hope of ever advancing beyond the stage of what Schlegel calls elsewhere, "the purposelessness and der lawlessnessof the whole of modern poetry"(Uberdas Studium he KA 1:223). Modern poetry, goes on to add, "is griechischen Poesie, like a sea of strugglingforces in which the particlesof dissolved beauty, the fragmentsof shattered art, clash in a confused and gloomy mixture... a chaos" (KA 1:223-24). With the question of then,we are broughtto the veryheartof romanticism's mythology, of a poetic work capable of producing itselfas it proprojection in duces its own philosophical theory, other words,to the heart of Lacoue-Labarthe's and Nancy's absolulitteraire. Now the romantic project of this literaryabsolute, as can be remarked yet again in the "Discourse's" own stated aim to overof come the originary formlessness poetic force,is also the project of literature's universal formation,and even formalization.As Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy point out in L'absolulitteraire-andas is confirmed in La Fictiondu politique-the romantic concept of for shaping "formation,"or Bildung,"is the place of intersection and molding,art and culture,education and sociality-and in the and figuration" end, for history (36). And thisis also why,at least linkin principle,Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy have littledifficulty

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ing Schlegel's, and beyond him, romanticism's, "theoryof literature" with an "aesthetico-political" program whose continuation and effects reach well into the "nationalaestheticism" Nazi Gerof many. The Bild, whichstartsout fromthe purelyformalconsiderations of naming and the kind of poetic activity thatmakes it posof sible,ends up being necessarily implicatedin the formation State power. "The artistshould no more wish to rule than to serve," Schlegel starts a fragmentthat becomes glaringlyclear on this do and point: "He can onlyform(bilden), nothingbut form(bilden), so can do nothingforthe Statebut form(bilden) thosewho lead and those who serve . . ." (Idea 54, KA 2:261). At stakein the name, "mythology," be then,would ultimately the of possibility passing out fromthe lawless chaos of disjointed particlesof beauty, fromthe discretepoetic Bilderproduced by transitoryand thereforeaccidental forces,to a systematic process of and politicalorganization,formation, and universality; to historical the comprehensiveorder of Bildungitself.In the early essay, "On afterbemoaning the the Study of Greek Poetry,"and immediately scattered images of poetic power offered by present-day merely thisas the crucial probart,Schlegel had indeed already identified lem for romanticism:"If it were only possible to clarifymodern poetry'sprincipleof Bildung,then perhaps it would not be so difof ficultto work fromthere toward the actual fulfillment its task. ... Bildungis the veryessence of human being" (KA 1:224, 229). The same principleand task is again specifiedin the "Discourse," mode that though this time in the paradoxical and interrogative allows the restof the "Discourse" to unfold: "Is therean art worthy of the name thatdoes not have the power ... to breathelifeinto its beautifulBildungenin accordance with its necessaryarbitrariness (nach ihrernotwendigen Willkiir)?" (81). To be trulyworthyof its one art mustbe capable of producinga new mythology, that name, nature of its poetic force to a systemwould harness the arbitrary atic exposition and development,in order finallyto achieve that of ordered confusionand charmingsymmetry contradic"artfully tions" (86) toward which the entireDialogue is oriented.20 in Nonetheless, the actual formationof the name "mythology" the "Discourse" reserves some unexpected twistsfor the smooth ideal it constantly alludes to. articulationof the politico-aesthetic thatthe necessity form-giving of For instance,Schlegel insists evenof face up to the threateningpossibility bringing fortha tually could resultthat,because itwould be purelyaccidentalor arbitrary,

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not be broughtback to a determination the basis of an organic on and self-conscious intention.What would it mean, Schlegel therefore goes on to consider, to beget only the lifelessimage of an emptyname? In this text,where the metaphor of poetic force is continuallysupplied by the biological process of procreation,it could onlymean incurringthe riskof givingbirthto a corpse. This is because it is alwayspossible thatthe god-likeprinciple,or soul, of spirituallife (Bildung)would somehow remain absent fromitsoutward manifestations (Bilder): "And isn't this softreflectionof the Godhead in man the true soul, the enkindling spark of all poetry?-Mere representation(das blosseDarstellen)... or artificial in forms(diekiinstlichen amount to nothing... Formen) themselves That is only the visible, external body, and should the soul be missing,then indeed it would leave only the dead corpse of poetry der Leichnam Poesie)" (85). (dertote Now it is preciselyas a preventiveto ward offthe threatof such a corpse thatthe actual example of "mythology" broughtforth is in the "Discourse." "Mythologyhas one great advantage," Schlegel has Ludovico say, "it allows what otherwisewould be in constant flight from consciousness to be apprehended bodily-spiritually and held fast, like the soul in the surrounding (sinnlich geistig), whichit glimmers beforeour eyes and speaks to our body,through ears" (85). Mythologyis thus the bodying forthof a name that would preventthe sheer power of the poetic act fromgoing nameless and formless, and thus fromremainingforeverinaccessibleto our eyes and ears, as well as to our understanding.It would be a kind of name that,far frombeing an emptybody, would not only be capable of containingour own soul, but would furtherensure In our capacityto apprehend it sinnlich geistig. other words,Schlenames the possibility a transcendental of coordigel's "mythology" nationof the senses (sinnliche and the mind (geistige Bilder) Bildung). And the particularbodily-spiritual formof the soul thatis put back intocirculationat thispointof the textis thatof a glimmering light. In the new mythology named by Schlegel, the soul would shine, and throughitsshiningprove itis not absentfromthe body,prove, in fact,that the body it shines throughis not an emptyform,that is, a mere corpse. This form, or Bild, that is being shaped, or gebildet, throughoutthe "Discourse," is, of course, the verymythof philosophy: the phenomenal intuitionof a light that would ultiof mately guarantee the intelligibility divine truthin thought as well as being. As Schlegel finally declares throughhis stand-inLu-

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dovico, and in a barely disguised revision of Genesis 1:1-4: "Be worthyof the greatnessof the age and the fog will liftfromyour eyes; there will be light before you. . . . Then would the empty chatterstop and man ... would understandthe earth and the sun. That is what I mean by the new mythology" (88). to But the transition this exalted pronouncementtakes one last the detour in Schlegel's text.Immediatelyafternaming mythology of coordinationcapable of appropriatingthe solar body principle of light to a spiritual process of (self-)understanding, Schlegel of points out that this livingsynthesis mind and body, this mimethen,is stillnot quite tologics,or budding "national aestheticism," And at thispointthe entireedificethe "Discourse" has alive enough. built around the mythological unityof image and meaning begins which names to wobble, if not topple altogether.For mythology, this specular system of sensuous Bild and spiritual precisely or cannot,saysSchlegel,endure Bildung, of poetryand philosophy, all by itself.In order to be maintained it constantly requires the of lightand life,one that would exist of another principle support categoriesoperativeso far: "nor can a beyond all the self-reflexive without highly a subsist(bestehen) originaland inimitable mythology und Unnachahmliches), someelement (ohneein erstes Urspriingliches that is absolutelyirreducible(was schlechthin ist), unaufloslich thing that after all transformations (was nach alien Umbildsomething ungen)stillallows itsprimalnatureand forceto shine through(noch die alteNaturund Kraftdurchschimmern .. ." (86). This passage lisst) confirmsthat the "soul" livingon in the name of its own "mytholconstructions ogy,"the primalforcesustainingall the mythological as of the text,cannot itselfbe construedor understood strictly an thatis, on the basis of a Bild properlyspeaking. The actual image, forcethatallows the body and soul to be held togetherin "mythology," according to Schlegel's own words here, can only be apthat proached "nachalien Umbildungen," is, only beyond all the anof transformations Bild und Bildungon which its own dealogical scriptions are necessarily based. This means that no image, illustration, figure,example-that is, myth-inthe text could ever forceit refersto, since thisforce access to the mythic sufficient give would itselfbe absolutelyinimitableand irreducible (unaufloslich And it furthermeans that each of the key und unnachahmlich). termsthe "Discourse" puts into circulationto describe itstrue subinnecessarily ject-the "soul," "light,"or "spark" of mythology-is to the precise extent that it names what by definition adequate

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and reduced, means of cannot be understood, that is, imitated by these veryanalogical images, or Bilder.Whateveroriginallightstill glimmersthrough the "Discourse" can thereforebe said to shine only insofar as it is not itselfthe mere sensuous appearance, or Schein,of anythingelse beyond it. What is the inimitableand irreduciblelightthat stillshines beof and transformations yond or behind all the forms,formations, and philosophicalthoughtin Schlegel's text?Schlegel himliterary self,of course, couldn't be clearer in his response to thisquestion: subsistwithouta highlyoriginal and inimi"nor can a mythology table element,somethingthat is absolutelyirreducible,something still thatafterall transformations allowsitsprimalnature and force allows the blinding to shine through, in which naive profundity (den Schein)of error and madness, or of foolishnessand stulight pidityto shine through" (86). Translators,of course have a great deal of troublewiththispassage, since a literalreading of its"light" so radicallychallenges our mostfamiliarpictureof romanticism by and the positingan absolute break betweenthe origin(diealteKraft) of end (alle Umbildungen) any myth whatsoever, includingitsown.21 What is trulyastonishingin thispassage, however,is notthe overt thathappens referenceto "madness"-no matterhow eye-catching of to be-but ratherthe silentinscription the word "Schein" at this particular place in the text. For how can "Schein," the word par excellence for aestheticrepresentation, appear preciselywhen the link constituting entireseries of Scheinand Wethe mimetological sen, appearance and essence, body and soul, formand substance, literature and theory, nature and history, been has lightand truth, to undone at itsverysource bya forceinassimilable all theserelated versionsof the same transformational logic? At thismoment,then, Schein can no longer be said to designate anythingbut its own peculiar madness and stupidity-no matterhow these words are translated-since what could be more blindlyfoolishthan to continue calling an absolutelyinimitableand irreducibleforce by the word Schein? of Now the structure thismadness is verycurious indeed. On the one hand, Schlegel insiststhatthe union promisedin mythology of poetry and philosophy could never itselfsubsistwithouta more originalforcecalled "madness." On the otherhand, by going on to call this madness itselfa Schein, also implies thatin spite of the he true nature of the force, it can always be reintroducedinto precisely the same transformational systemof Bild and Bildung to

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remains irreducible.Once again, it is possible whichit by necessity structureof what de Man calls "litto recognize the self-resisting to it may be somewhatunsettling see it reerarytheory"-though In cast here in termsof Schlegel's madness and mythology. both we are dealing witha movementof radical fragmencases, though, tation or of mutual interruptionthat can only go forward.The theory,or logic, or mytho-logicthat would systematizeliterary or specificity, the given textual example, is always interruptedby the it-but the particularexamples thatmustbe given to illustrate also have a wayof generalizingthemselves resultingfragmentation however aberrant such formalsysinto a systematic formulation, of tems have just been shown to be. The interruption theoryby Schein or literature, of mimo-or mytho-logic the untranslatable by of madness, or of Bild(ung) by the empty name, must be fragof mented, or interruptedin its turn by the ensuing statement its own truth, and so on and so forth.And nothing,Schlegel seems to be saying,can stop thisendless process of permanentinterruption. At least, thisis what he can now be understood to be sayingin that definitionof irony he ever gave: "Irony is a most self-resisting 668, KA 18:85). Fragment permanent parabasis-" (Philosophical of the The truthis thatironyinterrupts possibility fully saturating, and thereforeunderstanding,the poetic fieldof Bilderit necessarilybelongs to. But this philosophicaltruthcan be reached only by means of the very textual examples it nonetheless requires us to that is to say, understand. Irony is thereforethis self-resisting, truth about the literary and non-reflexively repetitive, infinitely structureof all philosophical meaning. thatexemplifiesthis What is it,in the "Discourse on Mythology," truthabout the endless alternationbetween philosophical formulation and its interruption the ironic structureof poetry?The by question takes us back to the "emptyname" in which,according to Schlegel, the potential for mythologicalconstruction (Bildung) would no longer be underwritten any intentionwhatsoever.Of by that all the philosophical transformations occur in the textnone is more sustained or imposing than the one that,as we have seen, relate the mythological would ultimately image (Bild) to a systematic capacity for self-formation (Bildung) through the mediating anbilden).Beyond all process of poetic activity(bilden,umbilden, of these transformations (nachalien Umbildungen) one and the same name-Bild-there is no denyingthe absolutelyinimitableand idmad, forcethatcan stillbe seen shining iomatic,thatis to say,truly

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througheach of them. This originaryforceis able to bringall the constellationtogetherin Schlegel's own text names of this mythic linksformedby what because of the unconditionally arbitrary only refersto as the "ironythatliveseven in the smallestpartsof he also b-i-l-d of the whole" (86). Such a scattering the literalfragments indeed constitutea whollyinimitableScheinin Schlegel's text, do and it mustalso remain foreverirreducibleto an originalintention that would stillbe accessible to us as such. to It may seem a bit farfetched, naive, or even arbitrary, make in of ironytributary thiswayto whatis nowadays Schlegel'sconcept referredto as "the playof the letter."22 often,thoughmisleadingly, But it is this ironic law of the letter-at one and the same time absolutely arbitraryand necessary as Saussure will later put it, of echoing in his own way the characterization Socratic irony in 108-that is nonethelessalwaysdissimulatedand Fragment Lyceum readable in Schlegel's text.Thus, and on the verythreshtherefore old of the dialogue in which the "Discourse of Mythology"will unfold,Schlegel insists:"Whereverlivingspiritappears held fastin thereis art,thereis the generationand isolationof a formedletter, a substance, material to overcome, implementsto put to work, a it projectand laws forcarrying out" (60). This, of course, is notjust a general theoreticalstatementabout the production and use of alphabetic letters-that is, the semioticprinciplein its barest posof It sible formulation. is also the actual implementation those very elements the text will later put to work in its own mythological construction of romanticism: "Wo irgend lebendiger Geist in da einem gebildetenBuchstaben gebunden erscheint, ist Kunst, da istAbsonderung . ." (KA 2:290). In thiscase, the romanticproject announced, described, and carried out is that of fragmentationthe originary Absonderung (generationand sundering,or secretion) in of blank letters(b-i-l-d) thatwilleventually appear (scheinen) the formof a teleologicaldevelopmentof livingspirit(geistige Bildung). Fragmentationhere, though, is not only a project, finishedor unfinished,to constructmeaningful images-of oneself or one's own intellectualor political community.It is also the necessary accident,thatcan always play,thatis to say,the law of the arbitrary of such a plan in the ironicname of undo the systematic coherency of its own letters.Schlegel's text on the possibility a properly"romantic" mythology, then, is not merely,or univocally,the enthusiastic constructionof a universal philosophy of literature that totalitarand potentially would go hand in hand witha totalizing,

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It ian, national aestheticism. is, in addition,a more sober reminder about the literal forces that work through and actually serve to before theyeven get off the interruptsuch mythicconstructions That Schlegel was finallyled to exemplifythe enigmatic ground. structureof this mythby referenceto a radical form of madness and should in no way be considered a mystification, thereforea the threatthatis alwaysposed by it. On the contrary, from, flight only be designatingin thisway the permanentparabasis, or irony, that foreverdisruptsthe mythological unityof literatureand phiwould it even be possible to begin reading it in its true losophy light,or Schein.
Yale University NOTES in 1 GeoffreyHartman, "Criticism, Indeterminacy, Irony,"Criticism theWilderness (New Haven: Yale, 1980), 280. ed. seiner 2 FriedrichSchlegel,Lyceum 115, in theKritische Werke, Ausgabe Fragment and Hans Eichner (Munich: Ferdinand ErnstBehler, withJean-JacquesAnstett to Schoningh, 1958-91), 2:161. Furtherreferences thiseditionwillappear in the text. 56: 3 See also Athenaeum Fragment "Since these days philosophycriticizeseveryof thingit can get its hands on, a criticism philosophywould be nothingmore than a just reprisal" (KA 2:173). Theorie la de 4 Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe and Jean-Luc Nancy, L'absolu litteraire: du allemand(Paris: Seuil, 1978). An English translationof litterature romantisme the analysis, minus the presentationand translationof the German texts in in The Theory Literature German Absolute: of question, is available as: The Literary tr. Romanticism, Philip Barnard and Cheryl Lester (Albany: SUNY, 1988). Furwill appear in the text. ther references,to this translation, and referencein the work of 5 This fragmentwas a constantpoint of reflection of of Paul de Man. His reinflections thisdefinition ironymeritanalysisin their own right and constituteone of the most massive and promising challenges and philosophical about ironyas a literary addressed to the ideesrepues recently principle. Especially relevant for the present discussion is a lecture de Man delivered in 1977, entitled,"The Concept of Irony,"to be included in the voled. Andrzej Warminski (Minneapolis: U Minnesota, ume, Aesthetic Ideology, forthcoming). 6 It would not be entirelytrue, or fair, to claim that romanticirony is simply is overlooked by Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy. A good deal of L'absolu litteraire there are several key itselfwritten"ironically,"and, even more importantly, passages of the book wherethe romanticconceptand use of ironyis invokedand analyzed. Nonetheless,it remains true that for the most part Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy relyfortheirunderstandingof Schlegel's ironyon Beda Allemann's ratherpedestrian study,Ironieund Dichtung (Pfullingen:Neske, 1959), whichis cited in a footnote(135). The most importantand tellingreferenceto ironyin is L'absolu litteraire made in connection to Socrates and his subjectivemastery

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withinthe Platonicdialogues, as well as to Schlegel'sobvious failureto duplicate such masteryin his own writing:"Socrates . . . has always representedthe anof incarnationor prototype the Subject itself .... The reason forthis, ticipatory in Schlegel's case at least, is thatSocrates ... is what could be called the subject of irony ... which is the exchange of form and truthor ... of poetry and philosophy..." (86). To the extentthat ironyis principallythematizedby Laof and subjectivereflexivity "formand coue-Labarthe and Nancy as thisinfinite truth,or of poetryand philosophy,"it will necessarilybe denied the same disas attributeto "writing" it is articulatedand theoruptive statusthey willingly rized by Blanchot and Derrida. in der Der 7 WalterBenjamin, "Systemund Begriff," Begriff Kunstkritikderdeutschen Romantik (Frankfurt:Suhrkamp, 1973), 39. 8 Peter Szondi, "FriedrichSchlegel and Romantic Irony,"On TextualUnderstandEssays,tr. Harvey Mendelsohn (Minneapolis: U Minnesota, 1986), ingand Other 65-6, emphasis added. 9 Mme de Stael, De l'Allemagne 1968) 3:3, Chap. 11, (Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 162; cited by Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy in the French edition of L'absolu litteraire (22). to 10 Paul de Man, "The Resistanceto Theory," TheResistance Theory (Minneapolis: U Minnesota, 1986), 19. 11 Jacques Derrida was the firstto raise this question withrespect to L'absolu litin teraire his essay, "La Loi du genre," now collected in Parages (Paris: Galilee, 1986). Derrida refersto his own essay,whichwas first presentedinJuly,1979 at a Strasbourgcolloquium organized in partby Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy,as "a modest annotationin the marginsof [L'absolulitteraire]" (256). The problem,we are reminded by Derrida, has to do withthe enigma of "citing"an example of of withoutsimplyocculting the literary performance,the actual re-cit literature, theoreticalexposition: "What is at stake, in it and replacing it by a systematic is effect, exemplarity along withthe entireenigma-in otherwords,as the word the and undermines(qui travaille) logic indicates,the recit-thattraverses enigma abusive in thiscontext of the example" (256). It would perhaps not be entirely to cite a furthermarginal annotation by Derrida in reference to the kind of of re-markthe theoreticalre-citation literature alwaysentails: "here, then,is the which cannot be reduced to a subjectiveattitudeor consciousness..." irony, (264, emphasis added). 12 This is confirmedby the furtherstatement:"Purely theoreticalcompletion is remains asymptotic.... But it is impossible . . . because the theoreticalinfinite and indeed in thisnot being there,thisnever yetbeing there,thatromanticism henceforthbecomes the infinite the fragmentare, absolutely.Workin progress truthof the work" (48). en 13 Gerard Genette,Mimologiques: (Paris: Seuil, 1976). Voyage Cratyle iiber die 14 The "Rede uber die Mythologie"formsthe second part of the Gesprdch An Poesie,and can be found in the second volume of Schlegel'sKritische Ausgabe. is tr. "Talk on Mythology," available in Dialogue on Poetry, English translation, Park: PennsylvaniaState UP, 1968). Ernst Behler and Roman Struc (University sometimesmodified,will appear in the Further referencesto this translation, text. desoeuvree 15 Jean-Luc Nancy, La Communaute (Paris: ChristianBourgeois, 1986), ed. available in English translationas The Inoperative Community, Peter Connor du (Minneapolis: U Minnesota, 1991); and Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe,La Fiction politique(Paris: Christian Bourgeois, 1987), available in English translationas tr. Art,and Politics:The Fiction thePolitical, Chris Turner (London: of Heidegger,

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Blackwell,1990). To these textsshould be added an expose prepared by Lacouebeen published in English Labarthe and Nancy in 1980, whichhas subsequently under the title,"The Nazi Myth,"tr. Brian Holmes, Critical Inquiry16 (Winter, 1990): 291-312. Furtherreferenceswill appear in the text. "MimeSee, especially,the importantchapters called "National-aestheticism," Also essential,in this respect,is the chapter tology,"and "Myth,"respectively. entitled, "Myth Interrupted," in Jean-Luc Nancy's The InoperableCommunity, where Schlegel's text is inscribedin the followingway: "The notion of a 'new mythology'... contains both the idea of a necessary innovation in order to create a new human world on the ground of the finished world of ancient is and mythology, at the same timethe idea thatmythology alwaysthe obligatory form-and perhaps the essence-of innovation. A new humanitymust arise mustbe (accordingto Schlegel) nothingless and thismyth from/in new myth, its than the totalizationof modern literatureand philosophy,as well as ancient of revivedand united withthe mythologies the other peoples of the mythology, world. The totalizationof mythsgoes hand in hand withthe mythof totalization..." (51). desdeutschen der Idealismus, See, Mythologie Vernunft: HegelsAltestes Systemprogramm ed. ChristophJamme and Helmut Schneider (Frankfurt:Suhrkamp, 1984). relation At issue here, as always,is the vexing question of the over-determined between a constellationof discreteworksand the philosophicalor politicalideology arising fromit,which is also a versionof the relationbetween individual textual details and the systematic expositionthatwould encompass and understand them. In "The Nazi Myth,"Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy recognize and state this problem withall possible rigor: "[T]here is no doubt whatsoeverthat of and in particularthe tradition German thought,is not the German tradition, at all foreign to [Nazi] ideology. But that does not mean that the traditionis responsiblefor it,and because of thatfact,condemnable as a whole. Between a tradition of thought and the ideology that inscribes itself,always abusively, as withinit,thereis an abyss"(295). To draw as precisely possiblethe lines of the dogging our particularabuse and the depths of the particularabyss constantly own efforts understand Schlegel's "irony"would be the sole reason for exto of beyond the limits L'absolulitteraire. tendingan analysisof his "new mythology" thatSchlegel had no use whatsoeverfor There is a common misunderstanding and simplydispensed with it. A careful reading of those "intention"(Absicht) however, will show that it is never the fragmentsconcerning intentionality, as unintentionalor purelyarbitrary such thatinterests Schlegel, but ratherthe of possibility resolving the tension, generated in irony for instance, between intentionand accident (see, for instance,Lyceum 42, Fragments 108, and Athebecomes naeumFragments 305). A reading of the "Discourse on Mythology" 51, crucial preciselyto the extentthatit bringsthistensionto the fore and makes it an object of criticalanalysisin its own right. ordered and symmetrian The romanticcommonplace of constructing artfully cal chaos is a topos to whichSchlegel returnsthroughouthis work,and it funcand relationbetweenAbsicht of tions as a hypothetical synthesis the antithetical 103 and Athenaeum For other pertinentexamples, see Lyceum Willkiir. Fragment 389. Fragment of In order to preserve the illusion, or Anschein, the text's commitmentto a metaphoricalmodel in whichBild and Bildungcan alwaysbe broughtback to a specularly determined model, like that of the body and soul relation, most a translators take the Scheinhere to signify merelyfigural,and thereforeprovisional, "appearance" of madness: "quelque-chose d'originel ... qui laisse transparaitre l'apparence de l'absurde et de la deraison .. ." is thus the render-

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(316). Translating ing Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy opt for in L'absolu litteraire Scheinhere as mere "appearance," ratherthan as the more literal,idiosyncratic or leaves open itssubsequent transformation, and original"light"of mythology, formof madness. This is conor into a more constructed, gebildete Umbildung, withthe related remarksLacoue-Labarthe and Nancy make on "chaos" in sistent Schlegel: "II y a cependant, si l'on ose dire, chaos et chaos.... le chaos est bien aussi quelque chose qui se construit..." (72-3). It should also be noted that in Schlegel himself, the 1822-25 editionof his works,triedto softenthe blinding it lightof his earliertextbyqualifying as "odd and even paradoxical" ratherthan only draws more outright"absurd and mad." But this attemptat self-censure KA attentionto the force of the original (Gesprdch, 2:319). like Rodolphe the 22 This is precisely associationa serious philosopherof literature Gasch6, followingverycloselyin the footstepsof Lacoue-Labarthe and Nancy, would be foreverunwillingto concede: "[I]t is indeed questionable whetherthe very concept of the Romantic fragmentis ever enacted on the level of the "The Gasch6 saysin the Forewordto a recenteditionof theFragments. signifier," Gasche goes on to claim,"would be reductionist Romanticnotion of fragment," tr. when applied to contemporaryliterarytexts." See, Philosophical Fragments, Peter Firchow(Minneapolis: U Minnesota, 1991), viii,xxx. It would be difficult to imagine how that least tautological,that is to say, most fragmented,of all withoutenacting could ever have been written of definitions "romantic"writing Buch" ("Letter itselfon the level of the letter:"Ein Roman ist ein romantisches on the Novel," Dialogue, 101).