The Johns Hopkins University Press Substance

Title (To Be Specified)
Author(s): Jacques Derrida and Tom Conley

Source: SubStance, Vol. 10, No. 2, Issue 31: The Thing USA: Views of American Objects
(1981), pp. 4-22
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3684327
Accessed: 17-10-2018 18:30 UTC
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms
The Johns Hopkins University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and
extend access to SubStance
This content downloaded from 128.227.250.183 on Wed, 17 Oct 2018 18:30:40 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
TITLE (to be specified)*
JACQUES DERRIDA
THE T-I-T-L-E-E-R
Were I to venture stopping here, to pronounce this, the t-i-t-l-e-e-r,

audacity enough to be satisfied with it, or be convinced to leave you wi
I have just uttered, no doubt you still could not tell how to take it.
In more than one way the titleer can be taken, meant or even under
For as long as there is attention drawn to what we calmly call a "con
or for as long as a consistent discourse will not have encircled an e
language of this sort in its path, what I have just risked, or even suspen
pronouncing the titleer would probably allow your reception or your
standing to remain open, and open to question. What happens to
hearing the titleer) certainly is neither for nought nor void, nor even
indeterminate. You hear something quite well (the titleer), you begin t
toward several possible meanings of words, or of pieces of words
syntactical groupings which are sifted in shadow; you make them cro
paths or cross each other as if they were virtual sentences (the title ...
three words, for example, or of a common noun placed and suspended
title, if at least-another conceptual possibility is opened-you knew th
French word (the titrier spelled t.i.t.r.i.e.r. [or the titleer spelled t.i.t.l
But with your moment of discomfit, and in drifting about the wave
semantic froth in the air, still you dominate these doubts. They leave
awash on the border of a shore where you want to arrive safe and so
even arrive yourself. Awash because this suspension does not allow floa
the high sea, but in view of certain borders in whose harbor we wait
suspended as our vessels are brought to a standing or a stopover-to
or arrive. In any case the desire, if it chills the hearing of these words
form perhaps neither a sentence nor a discourse-le titrier, the titleer
desire draws, or at least calls you to this bank where meaning can fin
stopped, fixed, anchored-with the most precise mooring of a legi
You want to see the shore, you wish to discern the lines of the borde
And for that reason you would like to know what I mean
pronounce t h e t i tle e r.
Now I'm off to tell you all about it.
That--"I'm off to tell you all about it"-is what is called a pro
commitment, a plighted word. Now were I not faithful to this plighte
did I not keep it (what is always possible in the case, for example, wh
*A lecture delivered under this title for the first time on March 14, 1979, in Brussels
Louis College).
Sub-Stance N' 31 5
., . . .. ,- - - ... . :
. ..........-
I ..... ... . ...
... . . o.......
'~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~~~~~~?
JO, "" ;
? " '" "
.;
,, : ,' . ,
Hanna Hannah,
Story # 21, 1977,
mixed media on paper,
23" x 29".
6 Jacques Derrida
might place my promise between q

endless commentary of statement,
discursive event of the promise woul
certain border, half empty-but em
something else which is neither re
a position, like a ruse of a dummy
with fiction, will be none the less eff
fied)" for this lecture, I have made
Right off we might think that the lo
in a provisional fashion to take the p
indicated the empty spot of a title to be
found the true title. Therefore I ha
lecture this evening, and I promise to
this limit, this delay, this difference
may be allowed to flatter myself with t
occasion to deliver a speech entitled L
space of convention, thanks to the ag
passed among you and foremost, amo
ities of the premise. According to
rich here however to be placed on ex
pointed authorities have trusted me,
plighted word. But what therefore
coming, and to come and speak, her
what, without committing myself to
to speak. All the same about anything
furnish the true title to my speech
false, temporary title placing in chec
have my remarks conform to this ti
between the entitled (another nam
entitled, between the entitled entitlin
the most adequate agreement. But a p
context of this event would make all this business rather evident: if the
legitimate authorities of these premises signed a blank check honoring m
with an invitation to speak about anything under a title remaining still "
specified," it is only in authorizing the titles they recognize in me that m
such confidence. A whole legitimizing process is implied in this contract,
it forms infinitely complex networks of sub-contracts, implicit evaluat
codes of admissibility, more or less virtual protocol, in brief, of the esta
ment of an ensemble of titles-this time not in the meaning of what entit
names a work, a discourse, a corpus, but of what appoints, what legitim
function or gives status-a law (for example a right to speak in giv
conditions, etc.). But the two meanings of the word title in one law app
both, to a jurisdicity that I would rightfully like to interrogate.
In analyzing the protocol of this bizarre situation in which we
ourselves, at the border of a speech which has begun without having be
which, still without a specific title, is going to speak about who knows wh
Title (to be specified) 7
my opinion it seems hardly contestable that in acc

blanche they have rightfully or wrongfully judg
little-, or they have had to judge that I have alrea
the apparent confidence which they have conferr
of too much risk, and that therefore I had title e
me not to specify the title in advance. These titles
or wrongfully are recognized as mine, do not pa
or collegial legitimacy, for the analogies that could b
linkage for all kinds of juridical, jurido-political
lems, and the like. But they are of little interes
same, this evening, like every evening, I feel som
titles in question-in this instance I mean m
propped up on all sorts of norms and guarantees
nonetheless mixed in this is a vague disquiet, a
before an always possible, indeed imminent c
there is someone who, sitting in the back, under
despite the display of evident civility, does not al
contracts. And what would happen if he were no
coming, if he were to speak? Or if in speaking, h
in speaking of this or that or one thing or another,
his speech, if he were to leave the title blank ("to
invent a title bearing rapport neither with what h
the right to expect from him in these premises-t
And were this intolerable situation to last one or
daring to interrupt him?
So I warn you that this is about to happen.
I declare that I have the intention neither of r
specified)" by any other nor of having it specifi
going to remain on the border.
The title is here. (Le titre y est.)
By that I mean, now I'm off to tell you all abou
ago.
Let's say that I mean the following in the form of
the structure of a name, inducing effects of the
title it remains in quite a unique fashion, foreig
the very way it introduces an anormal referentia
illegality which founds the law and the right of
we begin to see an unfurling of theses which I am
In place of demonstration, in its stead, I shall put
a story, a recit. The premisses of a demonstration
therefore the passage of the story will be more
Suppose that the Titleer is a title, the title of a
lecture. Somewhere it must be legible. Legible, imply
a mark. And there is no title without legibilit
affirmation, I am not only referring to some
meaning in recalling that titulus will have signified
8 Jacques Derrida
inscription, a little trait or a little sign

short but legible mark incising a
Without need for this philological g
"title," I have to sustain that an ana
demonstrates that there cannot be a
its being recorded and without a co
the title having to be somewhere: by t
of a topology. No title without sp
rigorous determination of a topol
takes place only on the border of a w
its internal elements or one of its p
having title-value. Were it comple
the body by a distance greater than
there would be no more title. Such
the role of a title, for example, to m
on the border of my text, in accor
same words, pronounced inside of
countered elsewhere-in a dictionary
title-value but only a rapport in some
that you are already protesting. I h
now for awhile, even here, nothing i
and there remains however the overr
Justly: there will be a title only when
when the false title you have rea
recorded and programmed, at the s
replaced by a true, authentic and fit
title: the word can claim to be that o
its equivocation in the eye of the law
with you this evening-and where w
spelled (the orthography of law a
relation to writing, I come to exchange
(le titre y est), a phrase of two (four)
(or two). In the two cases of a compl
value will function like a name or ev
even if the referential structure of
and paradoxical, as I will try to
sentence-the title (is) here (le titre y
become the name or proper name o
refer to this text across all sorts
semantic values it ostensibly shar
here-which would be found elsewhe
the complications here which happen
betting on it-for it is a game in wh
specified-is due to the fact that the
this phonetic writing across the au
once to double, assemble together
sentence. All the more since, now that the time

at least if only that were possible-the noun titl
things. In Old French a titleer (titrier) was a monk
the titles of a monastery. He was an archivist, t
if every archivist must prevail over the order
archive without a title-what is to be said of a gu
recent and pejorative, devaluating meaning, wh
here, is that a titleer refers to a falsifier, a maker
counterfeit titles, as we would almost say of cou
is called entitling or titrage of money in a rath
Having decided to proceed in a more reflectiv
way of exemplum, story or samples of tales rath
first off that we might speak of the title of on
Despite its brevity, it defies every kind of res
friends (of whom one is the narrator) who, in
beggar. The narrator's friend gives him a false
friend who, lost in the spirals of reflection, f
forgive him. The tale that I leave for your dis
Monnaie" ("The Counterfeit"). For essential reas
referential structure of the title suspended th
determine or specify the indivisible trait bi
supposed to announce. On cursory reading it
effect, at stake in the narrated account, not just
false coin in general, but even more generally,
narrated content which apparently forms the p
narration. But the title can be implied other
discourse of the narrator, its narration as well
are fictions or simulacra-more or less figurativ
coin. In order to limit myself to this first fol
and more complex at that, but for lack of tim
title "the Counterfeit" (La Fausse Monnaie) has
story of the counterfeit coin and the fictional stru
is divided and suspended, but in each case i
something like a false title sent forth by a falsifie
is not all-and yet, however, with the apparent c
am describing in this fashion, you must realize tha
very summary analysis of the borders of t
claiming to entitle the content of the story
content-the truly false coin, the title also entitl
at least for being equivocal. We cannot tell w
cockeyed, and risks becoming the title itself, at lea
entitling border, of the false coin. It is a risk-bu
sure it remains undecided, imprecise, unspec
Somewhat as if the title "The Counterfeit" uttered or let itself be uttered in
the name of its personification: in refusing to let you know if I am the title of
the story told (the story of the false coin) or of the narrative fiction (tale as a
10 Jacques Derrida
false coin), I am entitling nothing prec

title; I entitle only myself. I am no mo
of my title; yes, I am, myself, the title,
this self-presentation in the first pers
does not give.2 For, in order that t
essential to the structure of its guise a
but as coin passing for real money
nounced for what it personifies at the sa
is. In order to entitle or function as a
present discourse; it cannot say, "Ther
For that, essential are its emplacement,
and for its heterogeneity with respect
structurally undecidable or, if you like
Counterfeit," a disturbing homonym
be read without showing or disclosing
whom we will ascertain to be the faithfu
falsifier bent on circulating his contra
same way "Title (to be specified)" or "
am, I entitle myself by false title.
But I stated that I found this exam
performance. Concerned too about n
mine which circulate more and more
coin, I had still contemplated analyz
immense poem by Ponge called Le Prd
practical violences of a proper noun su
one of its conditions the thing called the
field as noun, with its nominal referen
the present prefix in the word "prese
ready (prit), as an adjective (the loan [p
although in my opinion it has an orga
(The Field) is endebted, and La Fabrique d
the word pres as an adverbial or prepos
values, all these more or less thematic r
of an account, a tale, a myth, a fable
here, but also in a brief, economic
grammar, we can say that this title ha
every title, even when it does not h
(besides, which is extremely rare), pr
would even say, an effect of the prop
condenses the whole network of motifs
word "prd"), the words as a noun [p
pieces of words (pr6-), as adjective (pr
that it is, La Fabrique du pri praises all
ing and crossing them, in abysmal chia
a line which, in the text, separates the
external border in separating the bo
whose initials repeat those of Fennel (Fenouil) an

poem, on the other side of the bar. But in speaking elli
text, Le Pre, the title, "le pr6" names, calls, designs
zeigt), it is just like that even where everything in
thrusts, is nourished, present and presented like p
Le Prd names, prenames, calls (heisst), watches over, sum
pre of the text, but before the whole text as prd. In do
induces you to read all the fields, proximations or
the poem, all the accents which make it sing its so
normalize it. It also gives you an order, it enjoins yo
to read it; it makes the law, it bespeaks you witho
something to read: I am the field, I present mysel
want to know what field means, what prd means, y
(d'abord), you must begin by reading me, you mus
precisely. Thus here the title is ready (prit) to f
enigmatic reserve in the ellipse where it is kept-ne
nor out of the poem, suspended in its proper name
only makes the law right from a violence befor
normality of discourse, in throwing into disorder t
reference, in abusing contextual indetermination t
in placing about the name the abandonment of the
in the oracular power of the proper name the
sentences, it founds its own state, its own legitim
legitimized over violence-but a violence right away
language of writing. It is this madness of the title
this stroke of force laying down the law in the co
incessant violation, a rape perpetuated across the la
Across the law? What does that mean? If I trans
"rape of the law" we have yet to know whether rape of
violated or the law violating. The madness of the tit
exists between these two possibilities. Because th
signify that we are limited to one of these possibilit
necessary as incompatible, obligating according to t
double law and a double bind.
In foregoing both "La Fausse Monnaie" and Le Prd, I have chosen

recourse to another exemplary title for this evening's performance. It is abou
the title of a 'tale' (ricit) by Maurice Blanchot. For this title of 'tale' forms one
of the most problematic stakes of the text. If I have finally chosen thi
example it is because the 'story,' told according to one of the most unwar-
ranted narrative structures, is a showdown with the law. The narrator-at
least he who says I, who never happens to form a story and therefore to become
a narrator any more than he who happens to say "I," at the outer limit, to
account for his identity or identify himself in the way that the lawmen ask o
him-, the so-called narrator has accounts to settle with the law, at the reques
and provocation of the law at least according to two figures or two forms: one of
a sort of feminine allegory that he calls the law and another of doctors who
12 Jacques Derrida
could be called medical legists and who,

to tell a true story of the accident th
victimizing him. Because of this instanc
In effect, the very schematic and pr
before you this evening sticks to the bo
on law and literature that I would like to entitle "Du droit a la litterature."
At issue would be for example the history and structure of juridico-literar
relations. Here I will define neither the premisses nor even the most gener
perspectives of such a problematic. I would not have the time to do so. I shal
have to be happy with this: what I am sketching here in the title of the titl
will perhaps take place inside the more systematic analysis of a sequence or o
a grand historical configuration of juridico-literary procedures: what insti
tutes a new relation inWestern Europe among, let us say, first off, literar
production; then, positive law; and finally, the critical institutions of evalua
tion: of the traditional guard, of archivation, entitling and titled legitimiz
tion, of the institution of competencies, all of which the Universitas is the form
and premise par excellence. The model of the universitas in which we work i
the West-more or less well for some time now-has been set in place, with
course important but secondary variants in respect to a grand princip
structure, at a moment when-and in relation with-the inscription in
positive law of the fundamental decrees which order the propriety of works
copyright, reproduction, translation, etc. This event, of which neither the
structure nor content can I describe here, has had an essential, internal
and decisive relation with what others would call the inside most intrinsic to
the production of literary and artistic forms in general. So the instance of the
title (whether of the title of the work, the corpus, the legitimizing title in
general, of the title authorizing authority, guaranteeing the evaluation eval-
uating criticism, etc.) situates the spot or one of the essential borderlines and
therefore the line of rapport, the most apparent Bezug let us say, between
writing and law, between so-called literary writing and law. About this general
perspective in which I am involved elsewhere, here I will say nothing more. I
simply wanted to open the discussion in order to justify it right away and to
legitimize the choice of my example in order, then, to account for what I will
speak to you under the title of La Folie du jour by Maurice Blanchot.
Following normal appearances, La Folie du jour is normalized by literary
and editorial law, as the title of a work, of a book of small format published, as
the date of its copyright by deposit of duty copy indicates, in 1973. On its
cover, under the name of the author and above the name of the editorial
enterprise conventions prescribe us to recognize the title La Folie du jour
(Montpellier: Fata Morgana).
Title to be specified. It must be specified and made precise, but how? A
title is always an economy awaiting its determination, its specificity, its Bestim-
mtheit, what it determines and what determines it. Determining and de-
termined, determination always returns to it. It returns in the direction whence
it is responsible and in the direction that has always promised return from
elsewhere, and according to a very unique mode of return.
Of the immense reading that the unending b

structure defies every border and frame, I shall r
worthy of showing how and in what way, in playi
is a madness of the title. To use the expression "st
the very equivocation of import. To stake the law
law, but it also can mean to repeat or mime one's
summon the law as such. So it is that the law of the border is itself borderless:
tantamount to saying that it never summons itself as such.
What therefore are the descriptions, and what are the laws of these
descriptions which, in the case of La Folie dujour, emplace the title as the law
while forbidding it to function normally, to be determined in precise speci-
fication, to be identified and to summon in being summoned? I restrict myself
to the typical traits of this turnaround that goes out of control. Such madden-
ing twists spin around this: the sense of the title is a certain manner of not having any
and its event is one of not taking place. No more meaning and no more place,
therefore.
1. No more meaning (pas de sens). I recognize in La Folie du jour its title-
value, its title titled for reason of its place and of the juridical conventions
which its topos obeys. No criterion of internal reading (either linguistic or
semantic) allows me to discuss or contest the title of its title. Met elsewhere, the
same words, "la folie du jour"-which moreover do not form, strictly speak-
ing, a statement-will not have title-value, whether separated or detached
from the book, the corpus or from the context born in mind or, on the
contrary, that simply they are found written inside. This in the text bearing
this title, "La Folie du jour," the expression "la folie du jour" is to be read at
least once. And evidently it (elle) does not have the function of a title: "But
often I was dying without saying anything. In the course of time I was
convinced that I saw the madness of day face-to-face; such was the truth: light
became mad, clarity having lost all common sense ... ." Despite their absolute
identity, these two occurrences of the expression "la folie du jour" have
absolutely heterogenous functions. It is not because one of them is taken in a
phrastic remark ("I was convinced that I saw the madness of day face-to-face")
that the title seems to have been drawn off a fragment. Were the whole
sentence retained as a title as it can happen to be in certain cases, the entire
sentence would have a sort of nominal role as title and value heterogenous to
that of the "same" sentence inside the book. Here, then, topology poses the
law. It cannot be said that the two locutions are simply homonyms. To a
certain point they are synonyms although their mode, function and value are
not reducible one to the other. In the title the locution allows a supplementary
meaning to be granted to it, which reads thus: this is a title, I am the title.
Then the signatory or, if you prefer, the locutor is not the same. In the book,
"La Folie du jour" is signed-so to speak-by the narrator, or at least by
whoever says "I" from the very first word onward and, besides, by the person
who does not happen to become a narrator, to form an account and even, at
the limit of stating I, to be identified under his "I."3 While the responsibility of
the title is incumbent upon the so-called narrator-required elsewhere by law
14 Jacques Derrida
makers inside the "account"-the title, w

that before the law-editor, copyright, e
responsible. But if the law obliges one
author, the title is nonetheless a fiction
signs a check or a testimony before the
a real author, the title still is part of a so
play a role in the same fashion as what is
instance the other occurrence of "la foli
ing and guaranteeing the unity of the fi
It must be found on the outer border of what it entitles.
Separated from the border, the two occurrences must nevertheless belong
to the same whole, to what one calls the same context, here in the form of
corpus of a work: this book. And according to a certain rapport of ordered
proximity. This relation is not citational. In the duplicity of this occurrence it
is impossible to say which is the original and which repeats the other. This
iteration without origin rises or folds into its abyss and as this non meaning (c
pas de sens) oversteps polysemy towards a borderless dissemination, toward the
borderless border of the disseminal text. In order to see, let us try counting the
possible meanings of the expression la folie du jour; let us try counting wit
them, encountering them, taking account of them, accounting for them.
1. If we pay heed to the idiomatic syntagm "du jour" which in French
signifies "today," "here and now" (as in the locution "the order of the day,"
"the man of the hour" to mark the marking or remarkable thing of th
present hour). La Folie dujour is what makes an event today, that of the hour
today and of no other, and even that of the day today as the place and date o
the event, and in a way, its signature. And in the text thus entitled there i
enough to support this meaning. At stake is the event or advent of madness
of going mad at such a moment. Where do we situate the event? Did it ever
really take place? Whatever the enigma, the event is named several times, and
even in a certain place, as the order of the day. We simply cannot tell whether
it took place, what taking place means, or even if what had taken place was n
more than a vision. You can read (on pp. 17- 19 of the Fata Morgana edition)
the passage beginning with Dehors, j'eus une courte vision which is closed by
Tout cela 6tait reel, notez-le. In the center the one who tries to say "I" explains
"This brief scene brought me to delirium. I no doubt was unable to account
for it myself, yet I was sure of it, I had seized the moment when the day,
having knocked up against a true event, was going to rush towards its end.
Here it comes, I was saying to myself, the end is coming, something is
happening, the end is beginning."
2. A second meaning comes forth immediately to parasitize the preceding.
The event of the day (madness) is not. only what happens this day, even today
it is the order of the day itself ("I had seized the moment when the day, havin
knocked up against a true event, was going to rush towards its end. Here it
comes, I was saying to myself ...." An event of the day, therefore, as present
time and the possibility of the event of the present, of the moment. A
presence of the present, happening from the possibility of something happen
ing, to appear and to take place. An event of th

the account, day to day.
3. It passes, is passed and passes by the day as
in daylight, the ether of evidence, the middle of
evident meaning of a text which succeeds or f
impossible endeavor to make an "account" of th
which almost costs the sight-therefore the day
to say "I," the person whom I do not call the nar
when he risked his sight-or the day, he is fou
institution in which the official representatives
the law are exacting from him an account of th
given his title (as a writer) and therefore his c
furnish an ordered account of himself. He t
without telling it; presently we shall return to i
French the madness of daylight from which
which therefore strikes him more than ever ("I
having smashed glass over my eyes").
4. This fourth meaning is still divided, all of
"day" a fourth, fifth, sixth, indeed a seventh
us a week of meanings. The day as "right" or
perception or a half-hallucinating apparition) i
is what we see right off. But it is also light itse
faculty (as they say to designate the eye, the organ
possibility of sight. Now the possibility of sight, a
lieu of the visible is not invisible on that day, and
In this sense of night, of blinding-what happe
take place. And in this text there is a history of
interiorization, indeed of internment, of the r
hastens towards its end soon as it appears. It is
this course, this story of creation and resurrection
madness inherent to the day like its story, its b
its contrary. Light is mad because it is black
"common sense." And this madness will have been truth. He who almost "lost
his sight" thus enters into the "frightful cruelty of the day;" he can "neithe
see nor be seen," and he notes it directly: "The glass removed, they slipped
sheath under my eyelids and walls of gauze over their surface. I was not to
speak, for speech shot through the pins of the dressing. 'You were sleeping
the doctor told me later. I was sleeping! I had to hold up to the light of seven
days: what a fiery glow! Yes, seven days together, the seven capital ligh
having become the liveliness of a sole instant demanded an account of me.
Who would have imagined that? Sometimes I said to myself: 'That is death;
whatever happens, it's worth the trouble, it's impressive.' But often I w
dying speechless. After awhile I was convinced that I saw the madness of da
face-to-face; such was the truth: light became mad, clarity had lost a
common sense; it assailed me madly, without rhyme or reason. This discovery
was a sharp blow all through my life."
16 Jacques Derrida
5. Another meaning, but now I no lo

being impossible. In the paragraph I
accounts were demanded. If it accepts po
the reason as law demands, requires t
senses. Aristotle explains it quite well. La
enumerate the identities of meanings an
in a calculable narration, in a descriptio
(Zahlen). But here the account proves
plural, it is the day that demands an ac
seven capital lights, having become the
an account of me." Therefore the day
account, as representatives of the law ar
of the person who says I, to recount an
On the other hand, the law does not on
tives; it appears in person as a feminine f
the one who somehow manages to say I.
incessently among day, the madness of
law as well, who is also madness of law
in a long sequence-I do not have time
Fata Morgana Edition) which interprets
the authority of the author, his compet
possibility of seeing, surveiling, having
oramas, panopticons using the entire da
becomes richer still and, if we may rem
in overstepping another supplementary
6. For essential reasons we cannot acco
of the economy of the economy, of the i
Now in the French idiom, "jour" compo
with birth, if not with resurrection: "to se
and "give the day" (donner le jour), to b
sense, if you look over the semantic
meanings of "day," you can go on foreve
tives of the law that are posed here
everything under their eye, but it is he, th
is he, in saying "I," who gives them t
engenders them: he gives birth to the l
in exacting of the "instructed" person th
to recall what his title and competence
maybe I was not all the time! Capable? W
made to speak like judges seated in thei
(prits) to condemn me day and night?
"I rather liked the doctors. I was not
problem was that their authority increa
upon my rooms, they were saying: every
challenged my story: Speak, and it wa
myself. To them I distributed my blood,
the universe. I gave them the day (leur donnais lejou

them, I passed entirely beneath their eye and finall
other than my perfect void, and having nothing
stopped looking at me; very irritated, they rose in
you? Where are you hiding? It is forbidden to hid
Therefore it is he who gives the right of day to
even later, the law herself will say, "Ah, I see the
We are reading for the moment, I recall, only t
word of the title, "day." Were we to consider the d
ties of the expression "madness of day" (folie du jo
driven mad over and over again. The text plays on
word '"jour" happens to determine the madness
which happens in daylight (an objective genetive),
genetive, the madness belonging to the day, to the
"all common sense." Thus there is freed a step ove
belonging at once to the series, to the law of the se
its border in a heterogenous space.
7. And "la folie dujour" can also be understood as
of the word in the sense of "jour," the madness whic
dispersion without source or unity, without comm
proportion, direction of meaning nor of the wo
"day"; nor law; nor a word out of law, nor an outl
law. That is the folly: that logos is mad, that the d
to assure itself of its meaning, of the single meanin
univocality, at least of totalization of the remember
brance of the history of the polysemy of the day o
madness of the day is also the madness of the w
madness of this titular element insofar as a simulacr
of the law, a simulacrum of the trial which at once
gives daylight to law while playing the law, ma
judgment and the critical decision. We can no longe
of the linguistic, and even nominal instance which
title. Madness not only inhabits the meaning of "da
nominative of the title, that is to say as a prope
marks. There is madness: a proper name between q
word "day" is not between quotation marks on the
will have imposed the public reading of these quot
remains: who makes the law a quotation without q
A step over the border of meaning, I was saying,
adding: in a certain way the title will not have take
place, a border must at least separate it from what
this limit must be lawfully indivisible from a line.
Folie dujour is made to stake this law. According to
appears to be the first line of the tale (ricit), its u
found to bear only the double (neither the origina
"same" false incipit which, inside, if it can be said, o
18 Jacques Derrida
to the request of the medical logists. Her

see the necessity for the display: "I am n
known pleasure. That is too little to say
greatest joy. As for death? When I die (pe
an immense pleasure." Now on the next
to read that this first line, this first pa
injunction or request of the representati
any mark of the true beginning of the
greater than the whole. Here are the th
last, at least in copyright, but still those
They had asked me: Tell us how things 're

I am neither intelligent nor ignorant. I ha
to say. I recounted them a whole story to w
interest, at least in the beginning. But for
'After this beginning,' they said, 'you'll get
all over.
This paragraph, which is only a part of the general account, envelops here
the whole account as one of its folded parts, and its collapses the upper
border, the incipit of the book, upon itself. There is a first invagination
incorporating the border and internalizing the outer front of the first sen-
tence, the one looking toward the title as an internal surface. The external
surface has become the internal surface. But that is not all. The same
invagination is going to internalize the other border, this time t
border, that of the last word. I take up my reading where I had left
How so! The story was all over.

I could realize that I was incapable of modelling a story with these eve
had lost the sense of history, and that happens in many maladies. But
explication only made them all the more exacting. Then I remarked for
first time that there were two of them, that this wrench in the traditi
method, however, having been explained by the fact that one was an o
technician and the other a specialist of mental illness, perpetually gave t
discussion of the character of an overbearing interrogation surveiled and
trolled by a strict rule. Certainly neither one nor the other was the ch
police. But given two of them, because of the fact they were three, and b
the third was staunchly convinced, I am sure that a writer, a man who s
and reasons with distinction, is always able to recount the facts he remem
An account? No, no account, never again.
This "last" sentence, this apparently final line figures right at th

border of the body. Though it speaks of the resolution no longer to w
counts or tales, it remains a part of the internal surface, so to speak
border, of a story finished no more than a story which did not tak
whose request was made but which the ostensible narrator could not p
in a competent way, yet which he told at once in an incompetent an
than competent fashion, in a successful non-performance. Now in res
ourselves to the structure of the last trait of the line, of the still d
. . . . . . . . . . . . ': . mn m . : .: .: i: m
?r- " ... " "

0,
m.. m;'
....
i
mmI
m :i
I m;mm(
i?; (:
. .: :.( mm
m m m
mm ~~~G m m (;mmim m m a'mm m mmmm
. . .. i ,.... .
?;?..I..
i.. ar i
F' ......;
V,
" ... ... . . i ? mp i j :?r ;? .; ?

:m
... : ,?
I, . . .. ,,,;;. ..,:j
?i . .
. ... .. ... . ... :. ... .. ' ' " ,;??;'i .... .
20 Jacques Derrida
border, the "An account?" which op

then called the invagination of the upp
neither intelligent nor ignorant ....."
within the lower invaginated border, th
in all critical competence is called the
vagination crossing the first according t
chiasmatic invagination of the border
reading the indivisible limit of a begin
condition for every dictatorial emergen
critical effects of the border, the possib
All the more since the titling locution,
double of its occurrence inside the corpu
title exercises its authority only in order
ably "to be specified."4
Interminably undecided, reserved, in
formula that economizes the whole. The
the contrary incompatible with dissem
it enough (for want of time), but all th
have been assembled together under the
economy. The title draws its title-value
surplus through the economic operation
and potentiation of surplus. And th
tautological ruse and the law of this oik
have at least suggested, it is far from be
a sole orthogonal line. When surplus
economy and politics that the title of t
sidered.
I never demand of philology, and even less of what others call etymology
the guarantee of a concept. On the contrary, and Heidegger recalls it here
and there, from what is given one can look both to history of the language a
to the sciences which, in order to deal with it, must suppose it. There we mu
demand of the sciences and of languages the right of their title. Perhaps, an
from what we have just glimpsed in the madness of day, we can accede bette
to such etymological hypotheses about the word, about the noun "title
Through the Latin titulus, some refer to a radical contained in the Greek ti6
esteem, evaluate, honor, valorize), whence timi, evaluation, value, price to pa
juridical estimation for example of a penalty or a debt. And with the proper
axiomatic register of economo-politico-jurdicial evaluation, some take i
back to the Sanscrit root ti where entire folds of meaning are assembl
together in the idea of re-assembling, justly of reunion, colligation in the
mind, on the inside: whence the meanings of to remark, to research,
recognize, to pursue, to venerate, to honor, etc. This motif about th
assembling evaluation, the axio-economy which goes to its limit, to th
bewahren of Wahrheit, to this variety of which Heidegger says, in a sense
which is neither void, contradictory nor dialectical, that it is non-truth. D
Wahrheit ist Un-wahrheit (in The Origin of the Work of Art). As economy, in th
violence of its ellipse, the title is the truth without truth of what it re-assemble
a
?:4 B
~! 1??
~~O~i~B~-~ ;.* ~i f:;:'??'
?~? ~r"r:o
;?n I
i :i
rs?-3
?:?e?
i~irib
,II
e "
-j
r
?u
P'';B id
~i~lll n ??a
?-
~F~iio~ :'C
:~
r( ? ?;I ?!
,, p,;ip :i
;.-ii
i~a~ ~ ""
I*-.:
?
c'~ia: fL~L~
I" rI:
??~; ~?; s
F?i
;
?i
??~I: ~ ?;1.~
~"-~i~:~ ~;j-?-
" ?;-~? i~. Y;
i-""Y
Steve Conley, Captain

ah1,.~ I~: ~~
i' ~~??;: 1
Tivo, 1978, acrylic ??~-
on ~""
,,,
~~~"~sr
:1? -;6~.~ ~~i~ii~
linen canvas, 80" x 60". I I:
The
reas
One
if it
calle
of a
No
to a
And
I ha
it r
Emp
bore
atte
prot
Blan
"A S
dou
now
bor
eras
inst
bod
pati
insi
enti
mor
calle
Maurice Blanchot.
22 Jacques Derrida
Of all these subversions playing about

mock the law, that they transgress or r
all, or all these sophistications would not
without the instance of the law they see
for it without drawing reason from it,
in twisting it, this very reason whose m
opposing to it, from the outside, anoth
the law, this hubris of the title, this de
authority is called forth here and is reco
jour.
A lecture, you will ask, or a reading? Never again. In sum I have bee
invited, let us not say summoned, but honored by an invitation. In the title
a lecturer invited to present a discourse provided with a specific title. And
bind my discourse to my title, that is to say to fill in contract or promise t
title in blank for which I have been accredited: title (to be specified).* Is it t
same, now? Will I have been specific? Under what title have I spoken to yo
And in what title? It is a bit late for me to ask, but perhaps you will contin
to ask why.
All the more since the title is here, you will give it to me, it was never
lacking.
Translated by Tom Conley
NOTES
1. tr. note: from the quasi-medieval sense of t-i-t-r-i-e-r liberty is taken

sixteenth and seventeenth century variants of titler, tytler and titeler to fashi
here and ear. The most obvious ring of "the title (-is-) here" emerges in le tit
est. It remains only the first of the counterfeit sounds we should like to re-assem
orthography, in remaining faithful to the duplicitous intent (let us say, of a mau
who claims or asserts a legal title.' Obs.," (O.E.D.) has perverse echo in the way
sharp point in the history of title, equivalence, equivocation and the varia
(tickling, titration, etc.). In any case the twice repeated grapheme tr of t i t r i
obsessive shape in the French version of the text.
We must recall hos "tr" of the essay on Valerio Adami (see Carol James o
number) generates from the doubly invaginated chaismus of the columns of
Positions, such that t does and does not translate x; in any event, too, the tr, rr,
inception of the urgent mark displacing the myth of truth in the title. Wha
inscription is turned into a mobile frame, for the tr and X designate the twists
writing, whose contour allows us to see in ricit a tale or account that will have
follow, a graphic mannequin of tr disengaging a half-trace (trici, tri-ci, tri-ci, e
of its truth (viritie) in American or other translations.
2. tr note: Throughout the French text the law is couched in the feminine
of an allegorical female, a Justicia, pervade so much that it is almost impossib
a she and an it in the French version. The double bind of the French render
have a cacophonous ring in the English if we rightfully put forward she in i
3. tr note: His "I" is son "Je": as elsewhere, the text echoes an impossible p
and all the more when different personal pronouns shift over each others' su
avers to be the space of a dream, a son-je; later, the knee of Justice will thru
and Derrida in the shape of a je-nous, a catastrophic violation of the law of t
4. tr note: Here a prnciser, which we render as we do above, invaginates th
prit, prisence, etc., specified in allusion to La Fabrique du pre.

The Johns Hopkins University Press Substance

Caricato da

Informazioni sul documento

Titolo originale

Copyright

Formati disponibili

Condividi questo documento

Condividi o incorpora il documento

Opzioni di condivisione

Hai trovato utile questo documento?

Questo contenuto è inappropriato?

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

The Johns Hopkins University Press Substance

Caricato da

Copyright:

Formati disponibili

Title (To Be Specified)

Author(s): Jacques Derrida and Tom Conley

Were I to venture stopping here, to pronounce this, the t-i-t-l-e-e-r,

might place my promise between q

my opinion it seems hardly contestable that in acc

inscription, a little trait or a little sign

sentence. All the more since, now that the time

false coin), I am entitling nothing prec

whose initials repeat those of Fennel (Fenouil) an

In foregoing both "La Fausse Monnaie" and Le Prd, I have chosen

could be called medical legists and who,

Of the immense reading that the unending b

makers inside the "account"-the title, w

ing, to appear and to take place. An event of th

5. Another meaning, but now I no lo

the universe. I gave them the day (leur donnais lejou

to the request of the medical logists. Her

They had asked me: Tell us how things 're

How so! The story was all over.

This "last" sentence, this apparently final line figures right at th

?r- " ... " "

" ... ... . . i ? mp i j :?r ;? .; ?

. ... .. ... . ... :. ... .. ' ' " ,;??;'i .... .

border, the "An account?" which op

Steve Conley, Captain

Of all these subversions playing about

1. tr. note: from the quasi-medieval sense of t-i-t-r-i-e-r liberty is taken

Potrebbero piacerti anche