Voice and Phenomenon

Voice and Phenomenon was first published in 1967, Jacques Derrida's annus mirabilis, alongside Of Grammatology and Writing and Difference. The combined effect of these three texts was nothing short of epochal, announcing as they did the new philosophical project of "deconstruction." Of these books, Derrida singled out Voice and Phenomenon as his favorite. Here, at the outset of his career, Derrida engages critically with the most important philosophical movement of the last hundred years: phenomenology. Focusing on Husserl's theory of signs, Derrida situates the philosophy of language in relation to logic and rhetoric, which have often been seen as incompatible criteria for the use and interpretation of signs. His critique of Husserl attacks the notion that language is founded on logic rather than on rhetoric. In subjecting phenomenology to this rigorous examination, Derrida reveals that, despite its vehement renunciation of metaphysics, the recourse to phenomenological critique is metaphysics itself-the "metaphysics of presence." Leonard Lawlor's new translation offers a fluid and faithful rendering of this seminal work of deconstruction. Book jacket.