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- 105-
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Alain J.-J.Cohen
106
Oreste Pucciani was wont to suggest that Beauvoir's Pour une morale de
l'ambigut mightwell have providedan inchoative answerto Sartre'sexplicitly
statedpromiseof an ethicsat the veryend of Beingand Nothingness.Sartre'snotes
in theposthumousCahiers pour une morale makeeven moremanifesthis intention
to complementan examinationof an Existentialistphenomenologywith a treatise
on Existentialistethics. Actually,Sartre'selaborationupon ethics does take place,
albeit elsewhere,on the stage, anotherof his favoriteterrains,throughdramatic
fictionratherthan in philosophical writings."The theatretransformsideas into
concretelythat existence mustindeedprecedeessence,"
persons, and demonstrates
Pucciani(320).
underscored
Ethical conflictsare envisioned in systematicmises-en-scneat the heart of
many of Sartre'slegendaryplays. In Les mouches,1for instance, Sartre's Orestes
faces an Existentialist double bind, illustratedby his incapacity to avoid
choices- ultimately
temperedby remorseand guiltemblematizedby the (antiqueand
sadisticfliesor Eumenides.Thereis no way out
modern)aggressivelyand annoyingly
of thisdoublebind.Thereis no catharsisforthe Existentialisthero/antihero
(Cohen
1999). Besides showcasing Orestes as its morallyconflictedand psychologically
Les mouchesis a playabout"man's freedomin conflictwiththe
character,
fragmented
impotenceand omnipotenceof the gods" (Pucciani 320). The play also manifests
of reduxversionsof Homericlegends,
featuresin its combination
severalpostmodern
suchas iEschylus'sEumenidesand Euripides's IphigeniaamongtheTauri.
The virtuosoExistentialistdramaturgy
replays fragmentsof Greeklegend and
tragedy,at the core of which rests the case of Electra's passivity and Orestes's
and herloverjEgysthus)in revengeforthemurderof
hesitantmurder(of Clytemnestra
Orestes'sfather(Agamemnon).Thus,the hauntingGreekimaginaryempowersSartre
to focusanew uponquestionsof conflictand moralchoice, in an interweavebetween
a priori freedomand contingentfacticityand, moreover,in a necessarilyhermetic
reference
to the GermanOccupationof France(in itselfa compellingsituation). In
thus focusing,Sartreresortsto an illustration,throughdramaticfiction, of the
unavoidable moral questions, albeit posed contemporaneouslyin philosophical
terms.Thereinlies Sartre'ssecretof creativity.In a Moebius flow accompaniedby
suspensionsand parentheses,philosophical questionsneed the exemplumof fiction
while fictionleads back to philosophicalinquiry.
It is fascinatingto note that both Lacan and Foucault, among other intellectual
resortedas well to theGreekswhen
century,
figuresof thesecondhalfof thetwentieth
ethics,althoughtheirchoices were
addressingquestionsof a modern(or post/modern)
variedand divergentlymotivated.In L'usage des plaisirs, Foucault acknowledges
thathe is nota Hellenist,buthe marvelsat the Greeks,at the factthatsexualitywas
so homogeneousthattermssuch as hetero-,homo-,or bisexualitywereabsent from
theirvocabulary(187-89), and thatthe "appetite"drawsto those who are beautiful,
whatevertheirsex (192-95). Foucaultis impressedby a culturethat "stylizes the
aestheticattitudeof existence,"in thatGreekeroticsare interwovenwith an ethics
definedas an artand technof existence,insteadof being definedby prowessderived
fromsexual repression.As a result,eroticsdo not need to produceany prescriptive
codificationof sexual acts and practices(92-93, 138). Foucaultselectsfromthe moral
elaborationsand treatiseshandeddownby the Greektraditionand revisitsespecially
Plato's Symposium(along witha fewothertexts,as we shall discuss).
1.
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107
Sexualityis at the heartof Foucault's discussion about ethics, in the same way
thattheinescapabledilemmasand paradoxesconcerningchoice, and the constitutive
remainedat the heartof Sartre'sethical
doublebindfora consciousness-in-the-world
Greekerotics
(masterfully)
paradigms.In L'usage des plaisirs, Foucaultintertwines
and ethics. This consequentialmove has to be perceivedin the largercontext of
Foucault's philosophy. Earlier,in Discipline and Punish, Foucault suggests vast
studiesin the "micro-physics"of power,thus perhaps alteringprevious models of
powerthat had currencyfromAristotleto Marx. We may recall Foucault's earlier
of power:
memorabledeconstruction
The study of the micro-physicsof power presupposes that the power
exercisedon thebodyis conceivednotas a property,but as a strategy,[...]
thatone shoulddecipherin it a networkof relations,constantlyin tension,
in activity,ratherthan a privilege that one might possess. [...] [T]his
poweris exercisedratherthanpossessed;it is not a "privilege,"acquiredor
preserved,of the dominantclass, but the overall effectof its strategic
positions. (1979:26-27)
This shift in the definitionand elaboration of "power" has far-reaching
consequences. Foucault's (postmodern)notion of power is that of an interdefined
networkof unstablerelations,wherein"power is exercisedratherthan possessed"
(26-27). Relations of power,Foucaultelaborates,are "not localized," nor are they
"univocal." As Foucault's remarkableinterpreter,
Deleuze, highlights punctually,
Foucault's original concepts deconstructthe traditionalpostulates concerningthe
philosophy of power which had theretoforebeen held- postulates of property,
localization, subordination,essence or attribute,and modality (power-in-action
throughthe use of violence or ideology) (25-29). It is upon Foucault's formidable
thesis about the "micro-physics"of power, and power's "capillarity"(not unlike
Deleuze' s "rhizomatic"networks)thatFoucaultis able to questionsexualityafterthe
fact.Thus, insteadof dealing withgeneralmacro-theories
about power,or those of
political powerand the state, Foucaultis able to researchthreemicro-domainsof
everyday life- dietetics, economics (in the etymological sense of "home
- fromwhich much more precise theories of power are
economics"), and erotics
subsequentlyextrapolated.
It is in thisframeof mindthatwe may apprehendFoucault's turningto the study
of Greek erotics. Foucault focuses upon a single question: how did sexuality
problematizeitselfin theGreek and the Greco-Romanepisteme,in contradistinction
to theway sexualityproblematized
itselfin the Christianepistemel(In otherwords,
whatare the genealogy and prehistorythat account for such profoundethical and
epistemic shifts,given that the traditionalChristianconcernsfor sin, the flesh,
renunciation,and puritycame to be dominantethical paradigms,whereas those
concernswerenot presentin the precedingGreek/Greco-Roman
epistemel)Foucault
deconstructsthe traditionalopposition of a Greekexteriorityversus a Christian
"What is called Christianinteriority
is a particularmode of relationship
interiority:
with oneself, comprising precise forms of attention, concern, decipherment,
of the ancientmoralityimplies the
verbalization,confession.[...] [T]he exteriority
elaborationof self,albeitin a different
form"(63).
At the extreme,FoucaultcharacterizesGreekmoralityas "a stylizationof the
aestheticattitudeof existence" (106). Highlighting, although not exclusively,
Diotima's well-knownquestionsabouttheontologyof love itselfin Plato's Republic
(or the wingedcharioteerdominatinghis rebel steeds as metaphorfor the soul's
strugglewithitselfin the Phaedrus), Foucaultchisels his vision of the recursive
dominant moral and ethical tension for the Greeks: the opposition between
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108
Alain J.-J.Cohen
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109
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Alain J.-J.Cohen
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111
axis of identity,I-m, (i.e., the "Ideal of the moi" in relationto "moi") (1996). The
flow of the Moebius strip consists in this circulationof desire into identityand
identityinto desire.
The "R Schema" may be complex, but it helps figurethe relationof affectand
Whom-I-desire
transforms
who-I-amjust as muchas who-I-amaffectswhomidentity.
I-desire.In its origin,theinfant'sdesirefor"mother"is thwarted
by the law, by the
intervention
of the symbolicthird,or the dipus and the symbolicorder.Thus, all
futuredesires recathectsomethingor other fromthis original transgression.The
crimein the symbolicorder(i.e.,against Laios) constructsand structures
the law of
desire.For Lacan, the psychoanalytictheoryof "jouissance" accounts for the fact
thatwe are not only dealing withthe questionof a given pleasureprincipleand its
equilibriumwith anothergiven realityprinciplebut, instead, with sex and death.
Thereis therefore
an elementthatis transgressiveand "criminal"at the root of all
desire.This is thedesirewhichis made hyperbolicin dramaticfiction,and a fortiori
in tragedy.It is this systematicallysustainedtransgressivepowerthataccounts for
the clat of Antigone's character."She pushes to the limit the realization of
thatmightbe called thepureand simpledesireof deathas such" (282).
something
The lessons forpsychoanalysisthatLacan extrapolatesfromthe play Antigone
interrelate
the notionof desireand betrayal.They wereknownby everyLacanian of
mygeneration.They tookthe formof threepropositionsand an addendum
corollary
whichmeritquotingat length:
First,the only thing one can be guilty of is giving groundrelative to
one's desire. Second, the definitionof a hero: someone who may be
betrayedwithimpunity.Third,this is somethingthat not everyonecan
thedifference
betweenthe ordinaryman and a hero,
achieve; it constitutes
and it is, therefore,
moremysteriousthanone mightthink. The betrayal
that almost always occurs for the ordinaryman sends him back to the
serviceof the "goods," but withthe proviso thathe will neveragain find
thatfactorwhichrestoresa sense of directionto thatservice.[...] [F]ourth:
Thereis no other good than that which may serve to pay the price for
access to desire- giventhatdesireis understoodhereas the metonymyof
our being. (321)
Antigoneis the heroine. She is betrayed,of course,by everyone,because she
neveryieldsin herdesireto die. Greekheroesare all betrayed.Otherbetrayalsinclude
Moses's dyingbeforegettingto thePromisedLand, Socrates'sbeing given hemlock;
Christ's crucifixion.Perhaps we need such heroes to give us a taste of ideality,
inasmuchas theseheroesremindus of how muchwe have compromisedand yieldedin
ourown desire,all forthe sake of "goods." Perhapsthatideality correspondsto the
inestimablepriceof access to (theto-be-betrayed)
desire.In reinterpreting
the fabled
catharticeffect,Lacan' s virtuosoreadingof Antigonedistills an apprehensionof the
formidableand contagious beauty of Antigone herself as a transsubstantiated
reminder
of theartof existence.
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Alain J.-J.Cohen
112
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113
pass par l'thiquedu dialogueet par le dialogue de l'thiquenous rendonsci hommage DominiqueDesanti.
dont
University
of California,San Diego
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