agamben por de la durantaye.docx

7/25/2019 Agamben por de la Durantaye.docx

1/5

Giorgio Agamben with Leland de la Durantaye

Giorgio Agamben is the author of more than twenty-five books and

is extremely well known. My dog, Bear, is not. Bear is six monthsold at the time of writing and is exe!tional in many regards. "e isfunny and fiere. "is mother is an Akita, a #a!anese breed oneused to hunt large game suh as deer, wild boar, and Asian blakbears. $%or a time !ossession was restrited to the #a!anesearistoray.& '!eial outfits were re(uired for the handlers, and as!eial language em!loyed to address the dogs. )imes havehanged.

*f his father, not muh is known.+ found Bear on a dusty !orh in a very gang-ontrolled !art of

ast LA. "e was seven weeks old and in the !ossession of a kindbut extremely laoni older gentleman who had fought in theorean ar. )he !u!s belonged to his daughter, who left themwith him for reasons he was disinlined to share. Bear and hissister /agoya were being ke!t in a large rate, all day, every day,and were generally having the dog version of a very Dikensianearly life. + had to make a deision on site. 'omeone had alreadylaimed his sister and would be oming to !ik her u! shortly.0u!!ies are not !lentiful here, let alone ma1esti-looking littlehairballs with !roud hind !arts. + alled one friend for an o!inion

and she told me to get out of there fast. + alled another, who toldme to take the dog with me.Bear was, and remains, ridiulouslyute. "e a!!eared on the main web !age for a ma1or musi festivalbeause + ha!!ened to be walking by their !re-!arty when their!hotogra!her was oming out for a smoke. A literal ma1ority of!eo!le during the first month of our time together made some sortof exlamation. Many of them were artiulate. *ne day, in thes!ae of three hours, + was told2 3"e 1ust made my day45 3)hat 1ustmade my week45 and the beautiful and ry!ti, 3verything isbetter now.4 "aving 1ust moved to Los Angeles, + felt like + had

some insight into what it would be to hang out with someonefamous.

+ was raised with dogs, and to some extent by them. My firstmemories are full of dogs and !u!!ies, with the result that havinga dog is the natural state of my world. + learn many things from mydog, inluding that every day is what it is and only one5 that thisis wonderful5 that we should go to the !ark.

Giorgio Agamben, on the other hand2 + first met in the late6778s, in 0aris, where + was a student and he a teaher. + s!okewith him twie during this !eriod, eah time briefly. A deade later +

wrote a book about his books. hen it was finished + sent him ao!y, and not long after we beame friends. %or a time + would see


2/5

him fre(uently. /ow + live far away and we ommuniate likeeveryone else.

9eently + was asked by the editors of Bidounto interview him.nowing his retiene in suh matters + said +:d try, without muhho!e. )he very next day + reeived an email from Agamben,urgently re(uesting igarettes. )he !artiular ones he smokes areunavailable in +taly beause their Amerian manufaturer refusesto onform to uro!ean ;nion law by overing their hundred-year-old !akage with the bellowing reminder IL FUMO UCCIDE< 'o +leveraged Bidoun:s desires against his affetion and addition,with the following as result.

Leland de la DurantayeWhat do you think of my dog?Giorgio AgambenThe other day I was walking in the countryside, in

Tuscia, and came upon a horse in a fenced meadow. It suddenly cameover to me and reached its head across the wooden paling, trying totouch me. I pulled up and gave him a handful of grass in response to hiscourteousness. He accepted it, though purely out of courteousness. Afew moments later I ran a few strides and he immediately broke into agallop alongside me. or the ensuing hour we communicated perfectlyand profoundly. !ne thing this proves is that those who think thatlanguage is for communication are wrong. "anguage is not made forcommunication. It is made for something else, something perhaps moreimportant, but also more perilous. "anguage is, in fact, the principleobstacle to communication, which animals know perfectly well. They

watch us sometimes, filled by a strange compassion for us, caught upas we are in language. They, too, might have ventured into language,but preferred not to, knowing what might be lost. I imagine you havee#perienced something similar with your dog.

de la DurantayeThere are ready$made images into which %uropeanintellectuals, especially learned ones, and especially philosophicallylearned ones, are placed, and one of these is that of the sage, the sternthinker whose wisdom has come at the cost of ease, affection, &oy, theanimal pleasures. 'o you have a sense that others have this image ofyou?

AgambenThese images are made to protect people from the risksthat come with thinking about things. The opposite is of course thecase. The relation of reflection to sensation, &oy, and pleasure is that itsharpens and e#tends each one.

de la Durantaye'oes 'escartes seem cra(y to you? I mean that hecould classify animals as automata and at the same time take suchpride in his dog, )onsieur *rat + e#press such pleasure when)onsieur *rat sired a litter of puppies, and so on.

Agamben"innaeus -artesius certe non vidit simias./ 0'escartesclearly never saw a donkey.1 2os3 4ergamin, citing 5ascal -'escartes

incertain et inutile./ 0'escartes uncertain and useless.1de la DurantayeWhen I was starting high school my 0hippie1 mother


3/5

once punished me for sneaking out at night by re6uiring that I read5eter 7inger8s bookAnimal Liberation. )any years later I happened tobe seated ne#t to 5eter 7inger at an academic dinner. We had beenasked to select our entr3es in advance9 I had selected a nonliberatedanimal. We naturally fell to taking about animals and he told me hedidn8t have much feeling for them, which is to say his interest in the6uestion was divorced from any particular emotional appeal. how dothings stand with you and the animal kingdom?

AgambenI have always known that I am an animal. As my teacher2os3 4ergamin liked to say, :o soy un animal. ;nfortunately, the animalhas been confined by an anthropological process that accords anidentity to the human only by e#cluding the animal. What is more, I thinkthat we should speak in such a conte#t not only of animals. 5lants, too,are alive. They are the highest form of life, infinitely superior to the so$called animals + mankind included.

de la DurantayeIt seems that there are a class of things we canlearn from animals that is very large, but has much to do with a timehori(on. )y dog was very e#cited about raw meat twenty minutes ago,and very frustrated about not being allowed to eat one of my shoes.


4/5

world, however, this means that not even we have been e#pelled fromparadise, only that for some reason we imagine that we have been. Thisis why we are so hard for other animals to understand.

de la DurantayeI remember you and a painter friend oncediscussing a >oman parrot. ould you remind me what it said?

AgambenIn the late @Bs we often dined in a >oman restaurantcalled "a 7ora "ella, whose owner had a gracula religiosa, a myna bird,one of those birds that can perfectly imitate the human voice, as well asthe voices of other animals. %very time I walked by the bird would greetme by saying, -Hi, how8s it going?/ !ne time I was annoyed and replied,-:ou always say the same thing./ To my terror the bird said, -7o doyouC/ It might be possible to find an e#planation, but the e#perience wasan unforgettable one.

de la Durantaye!n a different note, you were part of a group ofyoung leaders from around the world brought to harvard one summer tobe taught by Henry =issinger. What was that like?

AgambenI arrived at Harvard in 2uly @DE, after having taken part inthe final street fighting in 5aris in )ay. I was twenty$si#. !ne day=issinger gave a lecture on the political situation. I remember standingup and saying with astounding shamelessness, in a loud voice,-5rofessor =issinger, you understand absolutely nothing in politics./When I returned to Italy in 7eptember I learned that he had becomesecretary of state of the most powerful country in the world.

de la DurantayeIs it true that one of your fellow young leaders was

killed and then eaten by one of his political adversaries some time later?AgambenThe participants in the Harvard International 7eminarwere divided into two groups intellectuals and politicians. 4oth attendeda seminar taught by 7tanley avell. The young leader in 6uestion wasan African who seemed to me truly wise and who later turned out to bea ferocious tyrant. As such, he was cooked and eaten by his enemies.

de la DurantayeA friend sent me this link httpFFwww.cafepress.comFAgambenGpet$apparel What do you think of the fact that people8senthusiasm for you and your work has led them to make Agamben t$

shirts for dogs? 'o you have one? 'o you want one?Agamben


5/5

principle. What is more, we live in a society where the most beautifulthings can only e#ist in distorted form, can be e#pressed only throughparody.

agamben por de la durantaye.docx

Documents