The Unraveled Plot by Aukje Rooden

The Unraveled Plot by Aukje Rooden

Explores the connection between Jean-Luc Nancy's political works on community and his works on art and literature, thus providing not only a comprehensive introduction into Nancy’s work but also a broader examination of the social and political role of literature.

What is the connection between the work of community and the work of literature? And in what way is literature implied in Jean-Luc Nancy's "inoperative" community? The Unraveled Plot investigates the relation between two domains that have only separately been addressed in the reception of Nancy's work: his political works on community on the one hand and his works on art and literature on the other. Lucidly traversing Nancy's entire oeuvre, Aukje van Rooden offers not only a comprehensive introduction into Nancy’s work but also a much broader reflection on the social and political role of literature. Situating Nancy's thought within a larger philosophical tradition leading from German Romanticism to contemporary social and political theory, she offers new insights, with and beyond Nancy, on the forming of communities and how literature can play a role.

"This is a book people will want to readIt fills a gap in the secondary literature on Nancy's work, which has tended to concentrate on his work as a political philosopher, first, and his work on art, second. Van Rooden takes seriously the work of thinking through the relations between politics, community, and literature—all three—in Nancy's work." — Anne O’Byrne, Stony Brook University, the State University of New York

Aukje van Rooden is philosopher and literary theorist working in the Philosophy Department of the University of Amsterdam. She is the author of, notably, Literature, Autonomy and Commitment and coeditor of Re-treating Religion: Deconstructing Christianity with Jean-Luc Nancy.