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BLANCHOT
Michael
... WRITING
... ELLIPSIS
Naas
Iwould like to write you so simply, so simply,
so simply.
Jacques Derrida
Writing.
. -.
Maurice
Blanchot
Were
would
ning.
without
unspeakable.
While one can never, itseems tome, completely resist such a
temptation, one can at least punctuate one's desire, and thus instead
90
MICHAEL
NAAS
an absolutely systematic
possible that Blanchot uses the ellipsis in
and rigorous, though thoroughly unconventional, manner. My point
Thomas
theObscure).2
punctuation whose
identity consists only in remarking and reinter
notion
the
of identity itself, that is, the very coherence
very
preting
of meaning as it is thought to be found and produced in the process
of Literature), "before the work, the writer does not yet exist; after
thework, he is no longer there"3the one who writes is nonethe
to repetition, condemned
to reread the remarking
of thework. The writer iscondemned to leave him or herself open to
less condemned
the temptation
of takinghold of thework once again,which is to
BLANCHOT
...
WRITING.
..
ELLIPSIS
say, for the firsttime. As ifto justify the rereading of two of his own
early narratives, Blanchot writes in "After the Fact":
the most secretive and discreet of poets,
as to the manner inwhich the Coup de
gives some hints
des should be read. Even Kafka read his stories to his
Even Mallarm6,
forit]isperhaps inevitable.(62/89)
because
ones. This
claims
91
92
MICHAEL
NAAS
a complicity even, between the reader and the characters in the story,
or between the reader and the narrator or author. The ellipsis is a
a becoming silent, a sudden breaking-off in
sort of aposiopesis or idea which indicates that the narrator or
a
sentence
of
middle
the
author is unable or unwilling to continue, thatwhat has been seen
or thought cannot be expressed inwords.5 And yet the ellipsis almost
the
always conveys a meaning. The ellipsis ismeaningful because
reader can discern the forgettingor reticence of the narrative voice
within or behind
of silence, one
says more
and
BLANCHOT
. . .WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
wink
when
there is a pause in
the narrative, precisely when the narrative voice "stops" - when it
that the reader can most clearly hear the narrative
silences itself
tone. The narrative tone is thus deciphered at a level of meaning that
Indeed it isoften when
iseven more interior than narrative voice. Through this tone, it isas
ifthe reader enters into a different sort of intimacywith the author,
an intimacy that goes beyond the author's particular voice, and at
truths. In The
93
94
NAAS
MICHAEL
Space
When
we
and sense.
but perhaps
great.
he is summoned, the
writer"
still
what
holds
back;
"great
speaks is no longer
he himself, but neither is itthe sheer slipping away of no
one's word.
truththatisbeyond intimacy.
With nothingmore tobe deciphered,
thistypeof self-ellipsing
work opens onto thevery truth
of things.
And inthisintimacy
the
reader
has
the
beyond intimacy,
impression
not simplyintothe institution
of being initiated
of readingbut into
the secrets and truths of human existence. And yet, Iwould
argue
BLANCHOT
...
WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
withdraw
While it
would be possible, Ibelieve, to followthis logicof the
ellipsis
Iwill
I am.
. ..
Be quiet.
Ce que je suis .. .
Taisez-vous.
(T,49/53)
But I am infinitely far away now, and can go no further
As soon as I touch you, Thomas....
Or, je suis deja
Des
davantage.
(T,55/57)
(T, 58/61)
95
96
MICHAEL
NAAS
vraiment
...
(T,59/62)
So
concerning
the ellipses,
the
Do
to defy themetaphorics
of
Do theyinfactfunctionlikethetypicalellipsis?
depthor profundity?
Or do theycompletelydisrupt
meaning?Do theyeven belong to the
to the contract of language, or are they the very
points where and whereby everyday meaning is lostand the contract
is broken?
world of meaning,
find the firstellipsis, toward the end of chapter VII. Suffice itto say
that the two characters in Thomas theObscure, Thomas and Anne,
have simply been "trying to get to know one another." Chapter VII is
marked by Anne's happiness and hope, and equally by the risk or
danger of some "cataclysm." Indeed the entire chapter seems to re
volve around a tension between
norallegoricalfigures,
individuals
Thomas andAnne
ilyidentifiable
are situated in a time and space that is neither mythic nor real, but
that is, a time and space where all the narrative markers
literary
thespacingof an ellipsis.
into
BLANCHOT
..
.WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
risk and danger of this chapter is, then, to put it all too
briefly, that Anne still believes in a mythic or real time and space:
she still believes in the transparency of reading, and thus believes
can be read transparently. Hence
that Thomas that characters Anne lived "a few days of great happiness." For her, Thomas had
The
suddenly become
49). Thomas was
help, to heal, even though she did not yet know who he was. In her
"frivolity," then, Anne wishes to help Thomas by getting to know
him, by getting to know who he is.
At this point, Anne does not know that such knowledge is im
that Thomas is the impossible. She thus plays with a
possible
Thomas whom she does not know, ifonly because she thinks she
can know him all too well, believing thatwhile she does not yet
know him, someday
she will.
In thisway
have been
siblewhich he reallyis?
Much
of the "drama"
inother words,
97
98
MICHAEL
NAAS
disaster
know
to the
denies
lets the
has no
Thomas
this same question. Anne does not yet ask a question but only makes
a remark because her question has yet to be remarked
by the re
is
in
the
that
her
thus
asked
of
and
return,
sponse, by
question
by the
plete" (120/185).
By questioningwhat cannot be known,what down deep is
of herown question,Anne did not "properlyspeak
only theremark
ing" ask a question.
To do so would
. . .WRITING
BLANCHOT
. . . ELLIPSIS
The InfiniteConversation,
of Andre Breton's Nadja:
Blanchot
in its spec
question that looks formeaning behind speech and not yet on the
a question, then, that isnot yet a question of the
surface ofwritingellipsis.
The Ellipsis of the Impossible
Passive: the non-narrative, thatwhich escapes quota
tionand which memory does not recallforgetfulness
as thought.Thatwhich, inotherwords, cannot be for
gotten because
memory.
Writing of theDisaster
99
100
MICHAEL
NAAS
vous?] (T,48/51)
[Mais, qu'etes
This question is, perhaps, more radical than the first, indeed more
of a question than the first,because by replacing "who" [qul] with
"what" [que], it isno longer a question of personal identity,but some
sort of inhuman or perhaps even transcendent existence. Yet Anne
continues
remain silent. Anne questions Thomas because she does not know,
and does not know that she cannot know; and yet she questions him
because
temptation:
such a presumption in her manner of assum
was such a crude
that
he
could
give an answer (.. .) it
ing
to
treat
Anne
that
had suddenly re
the
way
impossible
There was
vealed
madness
to prevent
BLANCHOT...
is incapable of questioning
be capable of doing so.
what
WRITING
the unquestionable
. .. ELLIPSIS
is assumed
101
to
an identity
finally,a certain "identity" of the question and the response,
awesome
in and through the
aspect of the impossible, the question
now being drawn into the impossibility of a response.
impossibility.
Her firstthoughtwas to prevent him from answering. For
the great danger, now that by an inconsiderate and arbi
however, Anne
she could
not
102
MICHAEL
NAAS
bear the horror of this impossibility unveiled. Knowing that both her
are impossible, and yet still under
question and Thomas' response
too
their
much
about
impossibility, Anne feels the threat of
standing
this impossibility
"deposited inthedepthsof herself[au fondd'eIe
meme],
words, deep into the fearsome heart of Thomas, of God. In the depths
it is as ifAnne actually becomes
of herself, au fond d'elle-meme,
be even more
terrifying,now
BLANCHOT...
WRITING
... ELLIPSIS
she was sure that he would speak. And this certainty was
so great that he appeared to her as ifhe had
already spo
ken. He surrounded her, like an abyss. He revolved about
her. He entranced her. He was going to devour her by
intowords
she
I am...."
"Be quiet."
(T,49/53)
is the absence
guage. (31/54)
Given thiscontext,it
mightseem thatthe"ellipsisof the impossible"
coincides with fragmentarywriting that is,with the suspension of
all response. And yet, there is a fundamental indeed even more
103
104
MICHAEL
NAAS
than fundamental -
difference between
ellipsis.
I have already described the recoverable ellipsis, where the
absence of words is but a veil, where the hidden but decipherable
disruption of both the tone and the context of the story, poem, or
even essay a form of
fragmentarywriting, itwould seem, in the
sense. And yet, in The
Writing of theDisaster, Blanchot
issues these warnings the firsthis own and the second Derrida's:
Blanchotian
thiswarning:
"There
...
BLANCHOT
The opposition
between
the recoverable
WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
interruption.
meaning
thatwould
be absent somewhere
105
106
MICHAEL
NAAS
"disjunction."
"What Iam .. ."On the one hand, nothing can be understood
in this silence not even the impossible, for the suspension points
"signal" only the absence of meaning. On the other hand, what can
be understood - what can be readis this: "what Iam isan ellipsis."
Or this: "what Iam-that
isellipsis." Or this: "before
is,my beingIam that Iam, Iam ellipsis." Or this: "what Iam is this (,) that Iam."
"
Or this: "what Iam is ... With such
Imean
pseudo-interpolations
to suggest that this ellipsis is neither recoverable nor irrecoverable,
that the question
BLANCHOT
...
WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
would
lines later, the text leaves no doubt that this isan ellipsis of narration
an ellipsis of the narratorwhich Anne has
momentarily become.
For it is not Anne, notice, who speaks the following ellipsis (as the
English translation suggests), but thework thatwrites it, indicating, it
seems, that in her words there is no longer speaking but the ellipsis
ofwriting:
from
107
108
NAAS
MICHAEL
herself unpardonably
would know nothing.
she
are...."
She could
not speak,
.]
Anne could not speak and yet she was speaking speaking
an ellipsis that made her no longer able to speak. How could one
decide whether it isAnne who speaks or the narratorwho writes the
. .."?
ellipsis "she said
Justafter this exchange, Anne plunges forward once again into
the interrogation of the impossible, and her tale isonce again inter
rupted. The ellipsis interrupts themeaning of Anne's speech, Anne's
no longerspeak truly
of theconcealed depthsofThomas' being,and
yet
and so-
being right
BLANCHOT.
.. WRITING
...
ELLIPSIS
When
58)
first
fiveellipses inThomas theObscure and itssixthand finalellip
sis. Some fiftypages after the fifthellipsis, when it is no longer clear
is speaking or narratingis itThomas, the narrator, the "ab
surd spectator," the impersonal "One"? - we read:
who
uponme? (108/128-9)
109
110
MICHAEL
NAAS
...
[Ecrire ...]
form,
nothingthatcould be recastby somephilosopheme,
that is, by some dialectics,
inwhatever
sense dialectics
...
BLANCHOT
Blanchot,
...
WRITING
ELLIPSIS
111
to and repeating
selfbut ellipticallyrelatedto himself,returning
towriting,fromthepossibilityand impossibility
of theellipsisto the
to
ellipsisofwritingfromthetemptation say itallwithout repetition
or remainder to an
ellipsis of this temptation, from the depths of a
silence
be it ina line of narrative or a circle of thought
meaningful
an
to
ellipsis thatwould be "neither full speech nor a perfect
circle" but the "deficient displacement, doubtless" of a dot dot dot.
1
2
Maurice
Blanchot,
Thomas
theObscure,
(Barrytown,
Y:
ellipses
Maurice
Auster (Barrytown,
NY: StationHill Press,1985),60; Apr?sCoup (Paris:?ditions
4
Gallimard,
"Blanchot
along with
Blanchot.
?
5 A typicaldictionary
exampleof aposiopesisreads:"ThehorrorsIsaw there but
Maurice
The Space
Blanchot,
(Lincoln: University
Ispecifytwenty-four
points"in theFrenchtext"sincethereare severalmore inthe
English.Not only have a couple of ellipsesbeen added, but the threepointed
ellipses
have been
"translated"
in several
instances
in order
to
ellipsis with
in fact translate an
itmake
ellipsis? Does
one
when
happens
112
MICHAEL
NAAS
Maurice
Blanchot,
The
InfiniteConversation,
(Minneapolis:
Seuil,
1974), 274-91.
11
the ellipsis
simply"Writing".
Jacques Derrida,
A Note
on
instead of "Ecrire..."
the Phenomenology
we
have
of Lan
ofChi
guage," inMargins of Philosophy,trans.Alan Bass (Chicago:University
cago
Press, 1982),
173.