The Wake of Jacques Derrida

This book collects ten years of Peggy Kamuf’s writing on the work and friendship of Jacques Derrida. The majority of the chapters discuss a key aspect of Derrida’s thought, either from a single work or across several texts. Kamuf engages with a broad array of his work, from the 1960s to the posthumous publication of his teaching seminars. She also considers press interviews and the collaboration on a film. These close readings are punctuated by brief recollections from their long friendship. The chapters trace a reflection that undergoes the sudden event of Derrida’s death. Rather than take this interruption as its premise, however, the book sets out from Derrida’s own teaching that mourning begins with friendship and not just at the death of the friend. Thus, the strict chronology of the chapters, from 2000 to 2010, highlights a general illusion of ‘before’ and ‘after’ that comes undone over the course of the sequence.