de Beistegui, Miguel (2019) From the writing of desire to the desire of writing : reflections on Proust. In: Horton, Sarah and Mendelsohn, Stephen and Rojcewicz, Christine and Kearney, Richard, (eds.) Somatic Desire: Recovering Corporeality in Contemporary Thought. Lanham ; Boulder ; New York ; London : Lexington Books . ISBN 9781498581448

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Abstract

In Search of Time Lost can be seen as a novel about dissatisfaction and disappointment, suffering and melancholy – in short, a novel about despair. Whether in relation to Marcel or Swann, whether in matters of love or art, the novel is filled with flawed experiences, failures, and deeply skeptical and pessimistic views regarding our ability to reach genuine happiness, which can all be attributed to the fact that we are desiring beings. Desire is what seems to propel us into the world, and towards others, yet in the cruelest way, since the share of unhappiness it brings about far outweighs its moments of satisfaction. Furthermore, desire seems without end and condemned to being reborn as soon as soon as it’s satisfied. What desire does is to create a disjunction within experience, a gap as it were, between a reality that we can imagine, or anticipate, and the reality to which, sooner or later, it finds itself confronted. The present, then, becomes the site of a negative experience: it is either the not yet of a fulfillment to come, or the frustration of a promise that’s always betrayed. Does the novel provide a way out of the aporia of desire? And if so, is such a solution also a way out of desire itself? Or does the novel indicate another level, or, better said perhaps, another economy of desire, which would not be premised on lack, and on the disjunction between perception and imagination, present and future, but on another sense of experience?

Item Type:	Book Item
Divisions:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Philosophy
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Place of Publication:	Lanham ; Boulder ; New York ; London
ISBN:	9781498581448
Book Title:	Somatic Desire: Recovering Corporeality in Contemporary Thought
Editor:	Horton, Sarah and Mendelsohn, Stephen and Rojcewicz, Christine and Kearney, Richard
Official Date:	January 2019
Dates:	Date Event January 2019 Published
Number of Pages:	234
Status:	Not Peer Reviewed
Publication Status:	Published
Access rights to Published version:	Restricted or Subscription Access
Related URLs:	Other

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