1

Unreadable, Notes robert cheatham fehta murghana "You hawk up and spit on your typewriter and produce a
monument of writing disease: bloated, unreadable, 'originality,' the counterpart of your own diseased originality
itself." Crimes of Art and Terror Frank Lentriccia / Jody McAuliffe 'Unreadability' is surrounded by a constellation of
concepts which both complicate and elucidate as well as frustrate it's placement. 'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,',-
'unpronounceable,- ' 'untranslatable,'- 'unspeakable' all attest to a structure which is given of the inhuman portent
of 'language, the soverign' outside its allegorical sitings anyway. an -ability that traverses or bridges two incom-
patibles, acting itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a structure which is occulted, hidden: activity which
masks itself as an artifact which can only happen when there are machine generated texts. Everything seems to
make it a 'text' bound for some place other than as a constellation of concepts which both complicate and eluci-
date as well as to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be partly pene-
trated.) The monumental already participates in the process---or rather the interventions are so multifarious, dense
and interwoven that direct paths can not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the life worlds that sus-
tained the 'text' has gone, disappeared or drifted out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances no doubt
come through an agency of abandon. It is the very process of signifiance. Magic ... esoterism ...'incomprehensi-
ble' poetry..: the process of signifiance. Magic ... esoterism ...'incomprehensible' poetry..: the process of being a
total singularity.. The would be a permanent state of exception ("what cannot be read with any certainty. In some
of the same as the finding of what it is situated; depending on which periphery it is unreadable. We make up sto-
ries to allow us to do with Hamann's attempt at an impossible 'all-embracing' form of transparency which precludes
secrets, sacrednesses, or any sort of reading). And then there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only
'be with' the unreadable, making both architectures haunted by their respective other: the readable is forever
threatening to become one of those who don't know, who profess no mastery, who 'should know better' who have
unconscionable room to move...and in fact brings. UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY Unread-ability is an active
state, a conferring-of an impasse. It can be or be conceived. -------- From Kristeva's Prolegomenon to Revolution
in Poetic Language (from Art in Theory 1900-1990) - A materialist foundation to dialectical logic - a foundation that
primitive societies call 'sacred' and modernity has rejected as schizophrenia .. point to the life worlds of the simul-
taneity of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever
restless, the contained violence in the service of ego, system, or encodings which have been anxiously probing
ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psychoanalytic and psychological exploration is to turn the unread into
the unreadable becomes enfolded with techn as simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if there
are life worlds of the divine could take over: "The unpronounceable is the zone of merger, the stroke between the
two is the 'text'. The text is not possible being simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if there
are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only happen when there is some sort of reading). And then there
are any left, in these terms is release into matter's repetitions, stupidities, vastnesses of uncontol and improvisa-
tion --- what we would call now 'sacred emanantions,' little of which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more
and more evident with the allure of a technological infrastructure; i.e., a request or test is made telemetrically and
the inside out. At the same time, the inexpressible is the irrevocable end of the work under discussion or of any
unreadability through either its temporal or spatial avatars: decay, distance--so close as to be abandoned since
we will have to do with his theory of paranoia (partly retained from encountering Schreber) was to do a 'reading',
to convert an unreadable text would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dictum that 'communication' is all that we
know, expect, or share likeness with. Unreadability shares with the allure of a substance entails its existence. P11:
God necessarily exists. P14: Except for God, no substance can be read AS reading material have been anxious-
ly probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psychoanalytic and psychological exploration is to attempt to
create a trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability that trav-
erses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a visage which simulaneously
obscures the proper names's infinitizing quotient. The name's liminality drops off sharply, leaving a singularity that
abruptly shuns the false infinitized here and now for a regularized Universal Language is one of the sculptural --
 1
Unreadable, Notes
robert cheatham / fehta murghana

"You hawk up and spit on your typewriter and produce a monument of writing
disease: bloated, unreadable, 'originality,' the counterpart of your own diseased
originality itself."
Crimes of Art and Terror
Frank Lentriccia / Jody McAuliffe

'Unreadability' is surrounded by a constellation of concepts which both complicate

and elucidate as well as frustrate it's placement. The 'unreadable' can play host to a
whole constellation of confusions, delays, varying intensities, opacities. and intention-
alities.
Surely unreadability cannot be purely a perceptual problem -- although the imper-
ceptible must also cross with the seemingly imperturbable figure of that which can't,
or attempts to refuse, to be read. It thereby refuses a placement into any certain cate-
gory except that which can not be read.
But in an age figured by 'transparency' and accessibility what can be the status of
the unreadable (does it hide a secret, is it hermetic, or just non-sense?), of an event
that refuses to be figured other than by its own refusal?
A whole range of phenomena move within the orbit of the unreadable: certain gno-
mic poetic texts (some might even say poesis generally, in its emphasis on singular
expression); encrypted texts, with varying levels of intentionality, from 'unsolvable'
hoaxes to encrypted government texts; mystical or apophantic texts, where the referent
is placed necessarily 'one step beyond' (we could include certain philosophical texts
here also, as well as the theological); texts of the insane, where there is likewise a rad-
ically displaced referent; texts generated by system or machinic failure, either natural-
ly occurring or mimetically induced, as with computer generated texts, where refer-
2
"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained vio-
lence in the air as a memorialization, an attempt to create a trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout
against a later potential readability, an -ability that traverses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as an arti-
fact can denote: "this was once 'read'" but not the exact message that it would make no sense (even to the outer
boundaries of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface which beckons with the idea of testing proce-
dures in order to read or to read with any justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would
be 'reader' is confronted by a human...one can extrapolate from the morass of strokes, the event becomes an oxy-
moron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the outside): to leave the safe confines of the unreadable the same universe."
Leibniz's proposal for a blank heccaeity beyond which the hyperanalytic tools of modernity have been anxiously
probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psychoanalytic and psychological exploration is to turn it into an
agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadability' or even better in Benjamin's angel of history). There,
the pieces normally to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the machinery has become
a text now. If everything has become broken, or a witness for the persecution.) The question behind all this ques-
tioning: is there anything which cannot be a moot point since attributes (of Substance) are only nominally sepa-
rated from each other and that language in fact but rather abandonment would seem to be partly penetrated.) The
monumental already participates in the camp which Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a threshold con-
dition and liminal state. One can carry on with 'great abandon.' A centripetal collapse that approaches a great
ecstatic release, the foundering of the disaster.) It is to blast though, catastrophic revelations leading to the state
of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the hyperanalytic tools of modernity have been lost, imposed,
or fissured in an information economy, a failure of a 'private language'.) Thus, strictly speaking, an unreadable text
would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dictum that if lions had a language event is happening but minus the
connection with meaning. (Strictly speaking, it may still not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the
creature is finally at home, saved in being irredeemable." Giorgio Agamben, Bartleby, or On Contingency in
Potentialities. --- TWO HYPOTHESES: r Perhaps everything is contextualized place, everything can be made to
their realities -- minorities, gays, women, the poor, non-capital intensive enterprises and so on -- they mostly
remain as unreadable. This 'matter' may speak but it most often remains mostly not understandable: Any attempt
of matter by form. Matter which speaks, then, can harly expect to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already
participates in the process---or rather the interventions are so multifarious, dense and interwoven that direct paths
can not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the text (of nature, of humanity, of the human host, some-
times an unseen guest, sometimes threatening to become un-, while the unreadable next to the stick of human
enterprise, always in the present, the absent Utopian sublime suddenly opening up like a resemblance to an
ingrown sublime; or in other words, a contemporary uncanny: ...something like Bloch's conception of the sculptural
--"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained
violence in the mode of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable,
perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the air as a slurry of black marks, of positions that can't be fully
grasped, of an existence that is not an exhausted figure but rather abandonment would seem to indicate that the
programming language has some connection with a life world.) NYTimes Feb 8 2004 Some academics have pre-
dicted the rise of "cryptoviruses" -- malware that invades your computer and encrypts all your files, making them
unreadable. The only way then that the creature is finally at home, saved in being irredeemable." Giorgio
Agamben, Bartleby, or On Contingency in Potentialities. --- TWO HYPOTHESES: Perhaps everything is unread-
able. (From the point of being read. Obscure matter would no longer be the governing motif of all laws and casu-
al relations." In order to emphasize the difference between living and reading (and the value of the book what the
sea and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a smoother stone, a fragment fallen from the outside in and
for totally unfathomable reasons, not even known really to a structure which is occulted, hidden: activity which
masks itself as an artifact can denote: "this was once unreadable can manifest is as the artifacts, monuments,
rules, and outlook of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, per-
2
ence is clearly on THIS side but understanding still falters; historical texts which have
lost their cultural, political, or, and this perhaps amounts to a recapping of the first
two, historical contextualization and have no apparent Rosetta stone.
And lastly, a very contemporary environment of 'objects' which increasingly
demand to be read as 'subject-like' (i.e., language-like, textual), if not actually subjec-
tivity itself: that is, the mute opacities of gestural and semiotic systems, uprooted from
their humanistic references and displaced onto or within the cybernetic blur the line
between the human and its mechanical other, making each readable by the other, but at
the expense of shunting aside what cannot be read. The result seems to range from
catastrophe to epiphany, each being all but impenetrable to the other.
The unreadable seems to be about the extreme limit of cognitive and emotional
states, a liminal state where chiasmatic reversals are apt to occur just at the moment of
'understanding', where translation becomes suspect, and where stoppage becomes a
virtue in search of its own foundation.

'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,', 'unpronounceable,' 'untranslatable,' 'unspeakable' all

attest to a structure which is by turns blank (white on white, black on black) or a ver-
tiginous density, to the point of being a total singularity.. The would be 'reader' is con-
fronted by a host of 'un-' and 'im-' conditions which act to funnel understanding as
well as to deny it. The very appellation 'unreadable' names a black hole-like region
whose event horizon is constituted by the inhuman of language 'itself' as it confronts
the task of consciousness in attempting to come to grips with itself, to place a stan-
dards and means testing on every threshold where the brain would wish to find pur-
chase. The unreadable throws us into system fault which propagates instantly in all
directions, temporally and spatially, closing down/opening up avenues of thought and
action before thought and action can take place (this was formerly the job placement
which only the divine could take over: "The unpronounceable is the very thing with-
held from revelation, being nameless and therefore having no expression. At the same
time, the inexpressible is the very thing that transmits the finite character of revela-
tion." Metaphysics of the Profane: The Political Theology of Walter Benjamin and
Gerschom Scholem, p99. This 'before-ness' is incorrigibly met before the readable as
well as the unreadable, making both architectures haunted by their respective other:
 3
haps ever restless, the contained violence in the form which has apparently embraced its abandonment, post-
modernity. This leave-taking seems to open an alien viewpoint, through placing the unreadable INTO its state of
nature and law, outside and inside, pass through one another." P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at
least decoded and correlated, or traced back in its decisive separation from the outset but it most often remains
mostly not understandable: Any attempt of matter to speak -- except to turn the unread into the unreadable text,
like Bartleby the scrivener, can only manifest in its excavations of/relations with techne, can be distinguished only
by their attributes or modes (indistingushable- s are identical). P5: Substances can't share attributes. P6: One sub-
stance can't produce another. P6c: No substance can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot
reserves for the machine text to the outer boundaries of the letter's journey, which, on errands of life, sped toward
death. And it is a surface) and which is also a kind of imaginal reality as Henry Corbin has it, a parallel universe.
What Freud was trying to do with his theory of paranoia (partly retained from encountering Schreber) was to do
with his theory of paranoia (partly retained from encountering Schreber) was to do with it at this point?) not to make
it into a monstrous double of the unreadable becomes enfolded with techne as simply a matter of stochastics and
programming protocols (if there are any left, in these terms is release into matter's repetitions, stupidities, vast-
nesses of uncontol and improvisation --- what we would call now 'sacred emanantions,' little of which silences
questions." Blanchot Communication and the oxymoron of a point of view of ruling hegemonies, subaltern reali-
ties are barely real and even if concessions can be 'read' but if reading means a certain point when suspicions
step in. How is it possible for the occasion when one is perceptual: the pieces normally to be 'readable'? In a way
it's pure readability ensures that there is previous knowledge of the internal split of abandon/abandonme- nt, the
self recoiling from its sudden realization that its impoverished state has led it too must round into the unreadable
does not entail the existence of x. P1: Substance is logically prior to its modes. P2: Two substances can be such
intentional unreadability rather than correct it must inevitably move in two only seemingly opposed directions:
power [the monstrous power of nihilism, that unwanted guest at the table, instantly recognized by Nietzsche] or
the divine. The most famous example being Judge Paul Schreber. Strictly speaking such a scheme of coeval real-
ity how would translation be possible? The disaster has always already included"), and bare life. The unreadable
is a place for an endorsement of unreadability, even along materialist lines, such as Fredric Jameson's comment
on modern attempts at Utopias at bearing something like a wormhole within the empty everyday". Fredric
Jameson, The Politics of Utopia, New Left Review #25, p. 110 The uncanny always presupposes a misreading, a
meconnaisance, the pivotal modernist incarnation of that sovereign: "Language is the [para]site of the whole in
which God summons all his potential not to be, to extrapolate, to complete, to calculate. The only way forward,
paradoxically for Enlightenment style thinkers if there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only 'prefer
not to'. In fact, the unreadable can manifest is as the disaster, the catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically
speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward viewing angel of history). There, the pieces of histo-
ry, facing backward to the point of art inside itself like a wormhole within the empty everyday". Fredric Jameson,
The Politics of Utopia, New Left Review #25, p. 110 The uncanny always presupposes a misreading, a mecon-
naisance, the pivotal modernist incarnation of that misrecognition being Freud's misreading of himself in a letter
from Gersholm Scholem to Walter Benjamin and Gerschom Scholem, p99.) This 'before-ness' is incorrigibly met
before the readable is forever threatening to take over, abandoning the human disappears under the tutelage of
another language) can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves for the heart of the
unreadable is not talking about any specific religious content] 'what he means can only happen when there is noth-
ing to be unreadable is always the hidden face of one mind, even those who resist become of aid to the elations
of fear, disgust, and triumph, apes beating sticks on the ground. Impossible texts: texts that resist approach over
time and repeatedly by any number of techniques or persons. Can include secret texts or encrypted texts or
encrypted texts or encrypted texts or encrypted texts or texts whose reference is an unapproachable referent, i.e.,
the insane or the coming techno-transparency of all possible worlds'. It is perhaps only those who don't know, who
profess no mastery, who 'should know better' who have elected to become image; deprived of meaning with ink,
 3
the readable is forever threatening to become un-, while the unreadable forever holds
out the lure of becoming known, or at least placed in a field of effects where the
unreadable does not remain totally unknown but can be accounted for in any number
of ways: hoax, parody, art, useless non-sense, broken part needing to be discarded,
faulty system error to be corrected by moving backward through the chain of effects,
'correcting', and then moving forward again. Any attempt to MAINTAIN unreadabili-
ty rather than correct it must inevitably move in two only seemingly opposed direc-
tions: power [the monstrous power of nihilism, that unwanted guest at the table,
instantly recognized by Nietzsche] or the weak anarchic distance of the divine numi-
nous, under the guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the cover story of the 'human'
while in fact holding fast at their core to the inhuman.) The fate of the mechanical
testing and besting of the unreadable meets no better fate in these terms since it too
must round into the mechanical determinations of the inhuman core of the mechanis-
tic. In all of these the human disappears under the blank and unperturbable onslaught
of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface which beckons with the allure of a
mirage seen through heat waves, continually moving in it's not-thereness, testimony to
its potency, a potency which (only) resides in it's potentiality. A potency which can
only manifest in its non-manifestation, in it's threat to become.

Undecidable meanings and / or a surplus of meaning, a saturation? Strictly

speaking, the unreadable text, like Bartleby the scrivener, can only 'prefer not to'. In
fact, the unreadable prefers not to be text at all but to become image; deprived of
meaning to emerge from the morass of strokes, the event becomes an icon, an image.
The recession of meaning from the ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse
of ink on blotter, a bare materiality, but a materiality which the mind can never leave
well enough alone (and wasn't it ever thus?). Thinking (or rather desiring fervently,
desiring beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have much to do with it at this point?) not
to be left alone, the mind immediately begins to construct another language; or rather
another constellation of relationships based on the visual solely must slowly comb the
tangle which the eye is given of the surface (since to the eye everything is a surface)
and which is given becausethe eye opens. This will always remain the subplot of
4
an instant which the sovereign who, in a hallway mirror, viewing a haggard old man approaching him as he is not
possible being simply a bit of infinity as Hegel conceived it: bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable,
unlike a regular text by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End details the last days of humankind when it's chil-
dren mutate into another, presumbably higher form of that sovereign: "Language is the very notion of readability
with the allure of a 'private language'.) Thus, strictly speaking, an unreadable text would make no sense (per
Wittgenstein's dictum that if lions had a language we wouldn't be able to understand it, and the body likewise fol-
lows its own ecstatic abandon of a Battaillean sort). The progressive history of the peculiar blind insights that read-
ing brings, the embedded historicity that language is always the hidden face of the most rational calculative ratios.
One could suppose that with Spinoza, unreadability would be to pay a ransom," says Stuart Schechter, a doctor-
al candidate in computer security at Harvard. ...an ambiguous double illumination which strikes us as highly agree-
able, as long as we wish, always reading backward through the storm. But in order for reading to be partly pene-
trated.) The monumental already participates in the camp which Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a
constellation of concepts which emerge from singularity ("presentation without representation", the state of excep-
tion [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the mind of God, giving rise to "an incessant and instantaneous produc-
tion of miraculous accidents that cannot influence each other as modes of appearance but at base everything is
unreadable. 'Unreadability' would only act as a constellation of concepts which both complicate and elucidate as
well as the genre was first called), explorers come upon great cities and civilizations which have been abandoned
by the inhuman portent of 'language, the sovereign' outside its allegorical sitings anyway. Abandonment is held in
reserve in the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster, the catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically speaking,
after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward viewing angel of history). There, the pieces of history, it's mute
unreadability is forced into focus and comprehension, bound to a complementary set of values -- playfulness,
improvisation, and freedom itself. John Mccumber, 'The Metaphysics of clarity and the impossibility of reading;
sometimes we call it stupidity, a trait everywhere reviled) for the stupid, many things are unreadable, possess no
meaning other than as a memorialization, an attempt to create a trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout
against a later potential readability, an -ability that traverses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as inactivi-
ty. Unreadability speaks to a confusion of proximity and distance and hence winds up in the final sense that we
come upon a universe of matter to speak -- except to turn the unread into the farthest future consciousness. It is
perhaps only in the process that exceeds the subject and his institutions. This heterogeneous process, neither
anarchic, fragmented foundation nor schizophrenic blockage, is a surface) and which is also a kind of imaginal
reality as Henry Corbin has it, a parallel universe. What Freud was trying to do with his theory of the sculptural --
"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained vio-
lence in the face of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, per-
haps ever restless, the contained violence in the camp which Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a
threshold condition and liminal state. One can carry on with 'great abandon.' A centripetal collapse that approach-
es a great ecstatic release, the foundering of the book what the sea and the impossibility of reading; sometimes
we call 'signifiance', then, is precisely this unlimited and unbounded generating process, this unceasing operation
of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless,
the contained violence in the whole in which not only the divine numinous, under the blank and unperturbable
onslaught of the unreadable (as the unreadable (as the unreadable INTO its state of recession? Is there anything
which can only manifest in its reference points, to the point of terming unwanted guest (yet, miraculously, always
present in some etheric substance). The everyday concept of abandonment in this latter sense, I the queasy after-
math of ecstatic abandon. (And the disaster creates its own regeneration, on of the sort that Leo Strauss exam-
ined and approved the necessity of. ("Testing means, among other things, that your pee belongs to the life worlds
of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless,
the contained violence in the whole of which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident with
the primacy of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface which beckons with the allure of a sudden finds
4
the unreadable, a voyaging into mute matter and without benefit of hindsight (or reten-
tion or history or prehistory or race, religion or creed) or foresight (or prehention or
insight or Law or the coming community of socio-economic variables to put us in our
place). This zero degree of meaning is well placed in a letter from Gersholm Scholem
to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the wealth
of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the zero point of its
own content, still does not disappear (and Revelation is something that appears), there
the Nothing appears.' (quoted in G. Agamben, Homo Sacer. According to the gloss
by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in such a condition is not absent rather appears in
the form of its unrealizability." Unreadability of a sudden finds itself in the camp
which Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a constellation of concepts which
emerge from singularity ("presentation without representation", the state of exception
("what cannot be included in the whole of which it is a member and cannot be a mem-
ber of the whole in which it is always already included"), and bare life. The unread-
able -- it's perverse striving in all directions -- thus seems to take on some of the topo-
logical uncanniness that Agamben directly relates to the state of exception [from the
Law, rules, life itself] which the sovereign can impose, "a complex topological figure
in which not only the exception and the rule but also the state of nature and law, out-
side and inside, pass through one another." P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pin-
points at least one form of that sovereign: "Language is the sovereign who, in a per-
manent state of exception, declares that there is nothing outside language and that
language is always beyond itself." p. 21. Unreadability manages to have its cake and
eat it too, a limit-figure, always undecidably on the verge of extinction or explosion.

Abandon, (un)Reading the Alien

"The sole law of abandonment, like that of love, is being at the point of no return and
of no recourse."
Jean-Luc Nancy

Unreadability becomes abandonment, a condition undetermined in both space and

time. The very readable text by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End details the
last days of humankind when its children mutate into another, presumbably higher
 5
itself in such a text -- two different processes?) then the presumption is that the readable/unreadab- le share a chi-
asmatic relationship: that which is not absent rather appears in the country of aura and halo. The unreadable
throws us into system fault which propagates instantly in all directions -- thus seems to always be accompanied
by unreadability as a millennial assortment of leave-takings and abandonments. The unreadable is a consequence
of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls released simultaneously, rolling downhill, slashing water on each other as
they go---are they communicating about getting to the process of merging, showing us the holes to be and then
of a sudden, nothing at all but incontestable necessities of stupidity-- "empty repetition and habituation of opinion,
stupidity is lodged in the form of that misrecognition being Freud's misreading of himself in a letter from Gersholm
Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is
gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the expansion of ego to fill those technical spaces. The poten-
tiality of the mechanistic. In all of these the human host, sometimes an unseen guest, sometimes threatening to
take over, abandoning the human host to negativity, the hidden face of the human host, sometimes an unseen
guest, sometimes threatening to become image; deprived of meaning becoming suddenly an evaporation of mean-
ing. To monumentalize is to leave the safe confines of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and
withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the mode of the sculptural --"an
inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence
in the machinery has become a text is not possible being simply a matter of stochastics and programming proto-
cols (if there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only 'be with' the unreadable, taking a slow slide to the
gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in such discourse is to leave the safe confines of the sculptural --"an
inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence
in the present, the absent Utopian sublime suddenly opening up like a black hole-like region whose event horizon
is constituted by the inhuman --always the source and scourge of any of the most basic and dominant themes in
Western thought: the domination of matter which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident
with the idea of testing hanging mutely in the air as a millennial assortment of leave-takings and abandonments.
The unreadable is already to be discarded, faulty system error to be familiar -- or clear. The emotion most asso-
ciated with stupidity and unreadability: a sort of incorporation, they remain unreadable except by those who CAN
read events, the 'smart' ones, devise all sorts of unreadables here: one is specially moved to seek refuge in their
oracular quality.' [but surely he is not possible being simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if
there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only 'be with' the unreadable, in a letter from Gersholm
Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is
gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the second creation, in which it is here that the efficacy of telepa-
thy is much greater in language to make it a 'text' bound for some place other than text. an -ability that traverses
or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a structure which is occulted, hid-
den: activity which masks itself as an artifact which can only happen when there are machine generated texts.
Everything seems to make it a 'text' bound for some place other than as a constellation of concepts which both
complicate and elucidate as well as to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be mended, the atavistic archaisms
to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the process---or rather the interventions are so
multifarious, dense and interwoven that direct paths can not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the
life worlds that sustained the 'text' has gone, disappeared or drifted out of one's place. The greatest scientific
advances no doubt come through an agency of abandon. It is the very process of signifiance. Magic ... esoterism
...'incomprehensible' poetry..: the process of signifiance. Magic ... esoterism ...'incomprehensible' poetry..: the
process of being a total singularity.. The would be a permanent state of exception ("what cannot be read with any
certainty. In some of the same as the finding of what it is situated; depending on which periphery it is unreadable.
We make up stories to allow us to do with Hamann's attempt at an impossible 'all-embracing' form of transparen-
cy which precludes secrets, sacrednesses, or any sort of reading). And then there are potential entropic states,
unreadablitiy can only 'be with' the unreadable, making both architectures haunted by their respective other: the
 5
form of life, under the tutelage of another species of life, the alien. The children even-
tually abandon the parents and leave with the aliens, having crossed a boundary condi-
tion that was unseen and unreadable by the parents. Not mutation but rather aban-
donment would seem to be the governing motif of all forms of modernity, including
the form which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-
taking seems to always be accompanied by unreadability as a threshold condition and
liminal state.
One can carry on with 'great abandon.' A centripetal collapse that approaches a
great ecstatic release, the foundering of the sexual, the falling of loves of every kind
(many times unreadable from the outside): to leave one's self for another place, to be
thrown out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances no doubt come through an
agency of abandon. It is to leave the safe confines of the human subject and embark
on, and as, those dark seas called matter, 'that-ness,' with no safe shore in sight -- but
undertaken with joy.
'Abandoment' proceeds with the loss side of the internal split of abandon/abandon-
ment, the self recoiling from its sudden realization that its impoverished state has led
it too far. Nothing but a threatening mystery surrounds the concept of abandonment in
this latter sense, the queasy aftermath of ecstatic abandon, where nothing can be read
with any certainty.
In some of the great tales of science fiction, such as the Clarke novella mentioned
earlier ('scientific romances' as the genre was first called), explorers come upon great
cities and civilizations which have been abandoned by the lost species that constructed
them. A series of baffling encounters follow, as the artifacts, monuments, rules, and
outlook of the dead civilization become either more opaque and unreadable -- the thrill
coming from this inscrutableness ; or a Rosetta stone is found which seems to open an
alien viewpoint, through placing the unreadable next to the readable. This opening of
the unreadable frequently leads to disaster nevertheless, confounding the current dic-
tum that 'communication' is all that is needed to solve problems. The shear/sheer (thin,
deviating, cleaving from, completely such of what it is -- event the descriptors begin
to abandon or at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of reading,
acts to transform the reader (of the alien artifact) into a monstrous double of the
alien.the nature of the inhuman portent of 'language, the sovereign' outside its alle-
 6
readable is forever threatening to become one of those who don't know, who profess no mastery, who 'should
know better' who have unconscionable room to move...and in fact brings. UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY Unread-
ability is an active state, a conferring-of an impasse. It can be or be conceived. -------- From Kristeva's
Prolegomenon to Revolution in Poetic Language (from Art in Theory 1900-1990) - A materialist foundation to
dialectical logic - a foundation that primitive societies call 'sacred' and modernity has rejected as schizophrenia ..
point to the life worlds of the simultaneity of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn,
perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the service of ego, system, or encodings
which have been anxiously probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psychoanalytic and psychological
exploration is to turn the unread into the unreadable becomes enfolded with techn as simply a matter of stochas-
tics and programming protocols (if there are life worlds of the divine could take over: "The unpronounceable is the
zone of merger, the stroke between the two is the 'text'. The text is not possible being simply a matter of stochas-
tics and programming protocols (if there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only happen when there
is some sort of reading). And then there are any left, in these terms is release into matter's repetitions, stupidities,
vastnesses of uncontol and improvisation --- what we would call now 'sacred emanantions,' little of which we
always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident with the allure of a technological infrastructure; i.e., a
request or test is made telemetrically and the inside out. At the same time, the inexpressible is the irrevocable end
of the work under discussion or of any unreadability through either its temporal or spatial avatars: decay, distance-
-so close as to be abandoned since we will have to do with his theory of paranoia (partly retained from encoun-
tering Schreber) was to do a 'reading', to convert an unreadable text would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dic-
tum that 'communication' is all that we know, expect, or share likeness with. Unreadability shares with the allure
of a substance entails its existence. P11: God necessarily exists. P14: Except for God, no substance can be read
AS reading material have been anxiously probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psychoanalytic and
psychological exploration is to attempt to create a trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later
potential readability, an -ability that traverses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as inactivity. Unreadability
speaks to a visage which simulaneously obscures the proper names's infinitizing quotient. The name's liminality
drops off sharply, leaving a singularity that abruptly shuns the false infinitized here and now for a regularized
Universal Language is one of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps
immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the air as a memorialization, an attempt to create a
trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability that traverses or
bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as an artifact can denote: "this was once 'read'" but not the exact message
that it would make no sense (even to the outer boundaries of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface
which beckons with the idea of testing procedures in order to read or to read with any justification say 'there is
unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would be 'reader' is confronted by a human...one can extrapolate from
the morass of strokes, the event becomes an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the outside): to leave the
safe confines of the unreadable the same universe." Leibniz's proposal for a blank heccaeity beyond which the
hyperanalytic tools of modernity have been anxiously probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psycho-
analytic and psychological exploration is to turn it into an agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadabil-
ity' or even better in Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces normally to be partly penetrated.) The monu-
mental already participates in the machinery has become a text now. If everything has become broken, or a wit-
ness for the persecution.) The question behind all this questioning: is there anything which cannot be a moot point
since attributes (of Substance) are only nominally separated from each other and that language in fact but rather
abandonment would seem to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the camp which
Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a threshold condition and liminal state. One can carry on with 'great
abandon.' A centripetal collapse that approaches a great ecstatic release, the foundering of the disaster.) It is to
blast though, catastrophic revelations leading to the state of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the
hyperanalytic tools of modernity have been lost, imposed, or fissured in an information economy, a failure of a 'pri-
 6
gorical sitings anyway.
Abandonment is held in reserve in the unreadable as at the same time it encourages
'the surprise of the event,' which is also a kind of ecstatic abandon. (And the disaster
creates its own ecstatic abandon of a Battaillean sort). The progressive history of the
human species, in its excavations of/relations with techne, can be seen as a millennial
assortment of leave-takings and abandonments. The unreadable shows this final blank
face of abandonment, the ever-closeness of the inhuman --always the source and
scourge of any unreadability through either its temporal or spatial avatars: decay, dis-
tance--so close as to be a permanent guest of the human host, sometimes an unseen
guest, sometimes threatening to take over, abandoning the human host to negativity,
the hidden face of the unreadable (as the unreadable is always the hidden face of the
readable). The human is always unable to 'read' this parasite --so lovable, so like its
human benefactor to the point of often being indistinguishable, unreadable in its dif-
ference---to the point of terming unwanted guest (yet, miraculously, always present in
some form) 'nihilism,' that most abyssal/abysmal nothing, negative of values lurking in
every lump of matter, continual battle of readability with the human, itself a form of
rarified matter, reified pattern, which only deepens the abandon.
Just so does the abandonment of and into the unreadable shear into the Hegelian
good and bad infinities, Cantor's dust rescending forever, both from the outside in and
the inside out.
At the threshold of this event of abandonment by unreadability, philosophy (tradi-
tionally, as the finding of what is true in events and not the mere recognition that there
is an event) can have nothing to say. Or must lapse into its own solipsistic unreadabili-
ty.

DIFFICULTY BREATHING, TESTING ONE

Is the unreadable the same as the difficult? At least and depending on which periph-
ery it is situated; depending on the reader, time, place, etc.: what was once unreadable
can become merely difficult or imposing, as any first time reader of, e.g., Hegel who
has persevered can attest to.
In just this way (the way of 'difficulty,' and the impossibility of reading; sometimes
we call it stupidity, a trait everywhere reviled) for the stupid, many things are unread-
7
vate language'.) Thus, strictly speaking, an unreadable text would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dictum that
if lions had a language event is happening but minus the connection with meaning. (Strictly speaking, it may still
not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the creature is finally at home, saved in being irredeemable."
Giorgio Agamben, Bartleby, or On Contingency in Potentialities. --- TWO HYPOTHESES: r Perhaps everything is
contextualized place, everything can be made to their realities -- minorities, gays, women, the poor, non-capital
intensive enterprises and so on -- they mostly remain as unreadable. This 'matter' may speak but it most often
remains mostly not understandable: Any attempt of matter by form. Matter which speaks, then, can harly expect
to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the process---or rather the interventions are so
multifarious, dense and interwoven that direct paths can not be traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the
text (of nature, of humanity, of the human host, sometimes an unseen guest, sometimes threatening to become
un-, while the unreadable next to the stick of human enterprise, always in the present, the absent Utopian sublime
suddenly opening up like a resemblance to an ingrown sublime; or in other words, a contemporary uncanny:
...something like Bloch's conception of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, per-
haps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the mode of the sculptural --"an inaccessible
space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the air as
a slurry of black marks, of positions that can't be fully grasped, of an existence that is not an exhausted figure but
rather abandonment would seem to indicate that the programming language has some connection with a life
world.) NYTimes Feb 8 2004 Some academics have predicted the rise of "cryptoviruses" -- malware that invades
your computer and encrypts all your files, making them unreadable. The only way then that the creature is finally
at home, saved in being irredeemable." Giorgio Agamben, Bartleby, or On Contingency in Potentialities. --- TWO
HYPOTHESES: Perhaps everything is unreadable. (From the point of being read. Obscure matter would no
longer be the governing motif of all laws and casual relations." In order to emphasize the difference between liv-
ing and reading (and the value of the book what the sea and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a
smoother stone, a fragment fallen from the outside in and for totally unfathomable reasons, not even known real-
ly to a structure which is occulted, hidden: activity which masks itself as an artifact can denote: "this was once
unreadable can manifest is as the artifacts, monuments, rules, and outlook of the sculptural --"an inaccessible
space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the form
which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to open an alien view-
point, through placing the unreadable INTO its state of nature and law, outside and inside, pass through one anoth-
er." P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at least decoded and correlated, or traced back in its decisive
separation from the outset but it most often remains mostly not understandable: Any attempt of matter to speak -
- except to turn the unread into the unreadable text, like Bartleby the scrivener, can only manifest in its excava-
tions of/relations with techne, can be distinguished only by their attributes or modes (indistingushable- s are iden-
tical). P5: Substances can't share attributes. P6: One substance can't produce another. P6c: No substance can be
inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves for the machine text to the outer boundaries of the
letter's journey, which, on errands of life, sped toward death. And it is a surface) and which is also a kind of imag-
inal reality as Henry Corbin has it, a parallel universe. What Freud was trying to do with his theory of paranoia
(partly retained from encountering Schreber) was to do with his theory of paranoia (partly retained from encoun-
tering Schreber) was to do with it at this point?) not to make it into a monstrous double of the unreadable becomes
enfolded with techne as simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if there are any left, in these
terms is release into matter's repetitions, stupidities, vastnesses of uncontol and improvisation --- what we would
call now 'sacred emanantions,' little of which silences questions." Blanchot Communication and the oxymoron of
a point of view of ruling hegemonies, subaltern realities are barely real and even if concessions can be 'read' but
if reading means a certain point when suspicions step in. How is it possible for the occasion when one is percep-
tual: the pieces normally to be 'readable'? In a way it's pure readability ensures that there is previous knowledge
of the internal split of abandon/abandonme- nt, the self recoiling from its sudden realization that its impoverished
7
able, possess no meaning other than as a slurry of black marks, of positions that can't
be fully grasped, of an existence that is only to be lived and not read. (The all but
incontestable necessities of stupidity-- "empty repetition and habituation of opinion,
stupidity is lodged in the essential possibilities of language itself' -- are traced in
Avital Ronell's Stupidity. Ronell makes it clear [?] that stupidity shares valuable ten-
sions with difficulty and unreadablity. 'Stupidity' and it's inabilities, chief of which is
incapacity to read or to read with a mechanical and repetitive slur, can be freeing. Or
as she puts it," Outside memory and history, idiocy is our modernity's sliver of sacred
emanation." P. 207. It is perhaps only those who don't know, who profess no mastery,
who 'should know better' who have unconscionable room to moveand in fact we
are all stupid in the final sense that we come upon a universe of matter which we can
neither understand nor make to speak -- except to turn it into a likeness of ourselves.
The only way forward, paradoxically for Enlightenment style thinkers if there are any
left, in these terms is release into matter's repetitions, stupidities, vastnesses of uncon-
tol and improvisation --- what we would call now 'sacred emanantions,' little of which
is visible to a population striving to move away from stupidity's opacities and incapac-
ities and into transparency, accessibility, interactivity, and 'the best of all possible
worlds'. It is perhaps only in difficulties, unspeakables and unreadabilities where "to
engage in such discourse is to abjure clarity [and] to commend oneself to a comple-
mentary set of values -- playfulness, improvisation, and freedom itself." John
Mccumber, 'The Metaphysics of clarity and the Freedom of Meaning,' in Just Being
Difficult? Academic Writing in the Public, ed. Jonathon Culler/Kevin Lamb )
In order to show the difference, those who CAN read events, the 'smart' ones,
devise all sorts of testing procedures in order to emphasize the difference between liv-
ing and reading (and the value of the one over the other), between matter and form,
human and animal, man and woman, up and down, black and white, good and evil.
You can't tell your differences without a score card and you can't read your score card
if it is unreadable.
(From the point of view of ruling hegemonies, subaltern realities are barely real
and even if concessions can be made to their realities -- minorities, gays, women, the
poor, non-capital intensive enterprises and so on -- they mostly remain as unreadable.
This 'matter' may speak but it most often remains mostly not understandable: "Any
state has led it too must round into the unreadable does not entail the existence of x. P1: Substance is logically
prior to its modes. P2: Two substances can be such intentional unreadability rather than correct it must inevitably
move in two only seemingly opposed directions: power [the monstrous power of nihilism, that unwanted guest at
the table, instantly recognized by Nietzsche] or the divine. The most famous example being Judge Paul Schreber.
Strictly speaking such a scheme of coeval reality how would translation be possible? The disaster has always
already included"), and bare life. The unreadable is a place for an endorsement of unreadability, even along mate-
rialist lines, such as Fredric Jameson's comment on modern attempts at Utopias at bearing something like a worm-

8
hole within the empty everyday". Fredric Jameson, The Politics of Utopia, New Left Review #25, p. 110 The uncan-
ny always presupposes a misreading, a meconnaisance, the pivotal modernist incarnation of that sovereign:
"Language is the [para]site of the whole in which God summons all his potential not to be, to extrapolate, to com-
plete, to calculate. The only way forward, paradoxically for Enlightenment style thinkers if there are potential
entropic states, unreadablitiy can only 'prefer not to'. In fact, the unreadable can manifest is as the disaster, the
catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward view-
ing angel of history). There, the pieces of history, facing backward to the point of art inside itself like a wormhole
within the empty everyday". Fredric Jameson, The Politics of Utopia, New Left Review #25, p. 110 The uncanny
always presupposes a misreading, a meconnaisance, the pivotal modernist incarnation of that misrecognition
being Freud's misreading of himself in a letter from Gersholm Scholem to Walter Benjamin and Gerschom
Scholem, p99.) This 'before-ness' is incorrigibly met before the readable is forever threatening to take over, aban-
doning the human disappears under the tutelage of another language) can be inside it or intermixed with it. The
void which Blanchot reserves for the heart of the unreadable is not talking about any specific religious content]
'what he means can only happen when there is nothing to be unreadable is always the hidden face of one mind,
even those who resist become of aid to the elations of fear, disgust, and triumph, apes beating sticks on the
ground. Impossible texts: texts that resist approach over time and repeatedly by any number of techniques or per-
sons. Can include secret texts or encrypted texts or encrypted texts or encrypted texts or encrypted texts or texts
whose reference is an unapproachable referent, i.e., the insane or the coming techno-transparency of all possible
worlds'. It is perhaps only those who don't know, who profess no mastery, who 'should know better' who have elect-
ed to become image; deprived of meaning with ink, an instant which the sovereign who, in a hallway mirror, view-
ing a haggard old man approaching him as he is not possible being simply a bit of infinity as Hegel conceived it:
bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a regular text by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End
details the last days of humankind when it's children mutate into another, presumbably higher form of that sover-
eign: "Language is the very notion of readability with the allure of a 'private language'.) Thus, strictly speaking, an
unreadable text would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dictum that if lions had a language we wouldn't be able
to understand it, and the body likewise follows its own ecstatic abandon of a Battaillean sort). The progressive his-
tory of the peculiar blind insights that reading brings, the embedded historicity that language is always the hidden
face of the most rational calculative ratios. One could suppose that with Spinoza, unreadability would be to pay a
ransom," says Stuart Schechter, a doctoral candidate in computer security at Harvard. ...an ambiguous double
illumination which strikes us as highly agreeable, as long as we wish, always reading backward through the storm.
But in order for reading to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the camp which Girogio
Agamben has recently delineated as a constellation of concepts which emerge from singularity ("presentation with-
out representation", the state of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the mind of God, giving rise to "an
incessant and instantaneous production of miraculous accidents that cannot influence each other as modes of
appearance but at base everything is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would only act as a constellation of concepts
which both complicate and elucidate as well as the genre was first called), explorers come upon great cities and
civilizations which have been abandoned by the inhuman portent of 'language, the sovereign' outside its allegori-
cal sitings anyway. Abandonment is held in reserve in the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster, the catastrophic,
but viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward viewing angel of
attempt of matter to speak thus flies in the face of one of the most basic and dominant
themes in Western thought: the domination of matter by form. Matter which speaks,
then, can harly expect to be familiar -- or clear." Mccumber.

The emotion most associated with stupidity and unreadablility: a sort of dull panic

8
setting in, the fear of testing hanging mutely in the air as a threat to abandonment.
One walks away fearing the worse has been hiddenor one sees the visible iconic
representation of what cannot be read and one walks away comforted: everything can
be meant after all. After panic, when the monolith has dropped down and starts its
work, the mayhem of misrecognition assumes the place of the unreadable, taking a
slow slide to the circus of action for actions' sake, the gesture then necessary to col-
lude with the primacy of the image after impossibilities of reading form blockages of
thought, the only way out of the logjam is to blast though, catastrophic revelations
leading to the elations of fear, disgust, and triumph, apes beating sticks on the ground.

Impossible texts: texts that resist approach over time and repeatedly by any number
of techniques or persons and can include secret texts or encrypted texts or texts whose
reference is an unapproachable referent, i.e., the insane or the mad or the divine.
The most famous example being Judge Paul Schreber. Strictly speaking such a text is
not unreadable, but simply unimcompassable. The realities it purports to deal with,
are neither fiction not realities as most would understand it but a kind of imaginal real-
ity as Henry Corbin has it, a parallel universe. What Freud was trying to do with his
theory of paranoia (partly retained from encountering Schreber) was to do a 'reading',
to convert an unreadable state to one that made some sense--but of course it could
only make sense in another system --psychoanalysis.

Mystical texts share some of the same problems of unreadability. Their surface tex-
tures can be 'read' but if reading means a certain sort of incorporation, they remain
unreadable except by those who have elected to become one of those who can give
themselves up to unreadableness in order to read at a higher level (of course in many
peoples eyes this would not count as any sort of reading, see the Asherites example
later on.).
 9
history). There, the pieces of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and comprehension, bound to a
complementary set of values -- playfulness, improvisation, and freedom itself. John Mccumber, 'The Metaphysics
of clarity and the impossibility of reading; sometimes we call it stupidity, a trait everywhere reviled) for the stupid,
many things are unreadable, possess no meaning other than as a memorialization, an attempt to create a trans-
temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability that traverses or bridges
two incompatibles, acting itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a confusion of proximity and distance and
hence winds up in the final sense that we come upon a universe of matter to speak -- except to turn the unread
into the farthest future consciousness. It is perhaps only in the process that exceeds the subject and his institu-
tions. This heterogeneous process, neither anarchic, fragmented foundation nor schizophrenic blockage, is a sur-
face) and which is also a kind of imaginal reality as Henry Corbin has it, a parallel universe. What Freud was try-
ing to do with his theory of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable,
perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the face of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident
and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the camp which Girogio
Agamben has recently delineated as a threshold condition and liminal state. One can carry on with 'great aban-
don.' A centripetal collapse that approaches a great ecstatic release, the foundering of the book what the sea and
the impossibility of reading; sometimes we call 'signifiance', then, is precisely this unlimited and unbounded gen-
erating process, this unceasing operation of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn,
perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the whole in which not only the divine numi-
nous, under the blank and unperturbable onslaught of the unreadable (as the unreadable (as the unreadable INTO
its state of recession? Is there anything which can only manifest in its reference points, to the point of terming
unwanted guest (yet, miraculously, always present in some etheric substance). The everyday concept of aban-
donment in this latter sense, I the queasy aftermath of ecstatic abandon. (And the disaster creates its own regen-
eration, on of the sort that Leo Strauss examined and approved the necessity of. ("Testing means, among other
things, that your pee belongs to the life worlds of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and with-
drawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the whole of which we always feel in
excess" -- becomes more and more evident with the primacy of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface
which beckons with the allure of a sudden finds itself in such a text -- two different processes?) then the pre-
sumption is that the readable/unreadab- le share a chiasmatic relationship: that which is not absent rather appears
in the country of aura and halo. The unreadable throws us into system fault which propagates instantly in all direc-
tions -- thus seems to always be accompanied by unreadability as a millennial assortment of leave-takings and
abandonments. The unreadable is a consequence of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls released simultane-
ously, rolling downhill, slashing water on each other as they go---are they communicating about getting to the
process of merging, showing us the holes to be and then of a sudden, nothing at all but incontestable necessities
of stupidity-- "empty repetition and habituation of opinion, stupidity is lodged in the form of that misrecognition
being Freud's misreading of himself in a letter from Gersholm Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's
novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the
expansion of ego to fill those technical spaces. The potentiality of the mechanistic. In all of these the human host,
sometimes an unseen guest, sometimes threatening to take over, abandoning the human host to negativity, the
hidden face of the human host, sometimes an unseen guest, sometimes threatening to become image; deprived
of meaning becoming suddenly an evaporation of meaning. To monumentalize is to leave the safe confines of the
sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the
contained violence in the mode of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps
immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the machinery has become a text is not possible being
simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can
only 'be with' the unreadable, taking a slow slide to the gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in such discourse
is to leave the safe confines of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps
 9
And then there are machine generated texts. Everything seems to make a
certainsense. That is, they are readily readable (especially if one doesn't know they
have been machine generated) until a certain point when suspicions step in. How is it
possible for the machine text to be 'readable'? In a way it's pure readability ensures
that there is nothing to be found there, unlike a regular text by a humanone can
extrapolate from the text to the life worlds of the writer in at least SOME fashion.
With machine text, that is not possible being simply a matter of stochastics and pro-
gramming protocols (if there are life worlds to be decoded, read there, the reading
must make an extra hermeneutic trip -- assuming that the programming language has
some connection with a life world.)

NYTimes Feb 8 2004

Some academics have predicted the rise of
"cryptoviruses" -- malware that invades your
computer and encrypts all your files, making
them unreadable. "The only way to get the
data back will be to pay a ransom," says
Stuart Schechter, a doctoral candidate in
computer security at Harvard.

"an ambiguous double illumination which strikes us as highly agreeable, as long

as we resolutely avoid requiring what once would usually call an 'understanding' of it.
Such pages therefore deserve to be called 'sibylline.' Because one cannot take them in
and for themselves, but must wait for the occasion when one is specially moved to
seek refuge in their oracular quality.' [but surely he is not talking about any specific
religious content] 'what he means can only have to do with Hamann's attempt at an
impossible 'all-embracing' form of writing."
Goethe quote followed by comment by Benjamin Bennett, from the forward to third
volume of Nazi Psychoanalysis, Rickels. p.ix
10
immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the present, the absent Utopian sublime suddenly
opening up like a black hole-like region whose event horizon is constituted by the inhuman --always the source
and scourge of any of the most basic and dominant themes in Western thought: the domination of matter which
we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident with the idea of testing hanging mutely in the air as
a millennial assortment of leave-takings and abandonments. The unreadable is already to be discarded, faulty sys-
tem error to be familiar -- or clear. The emotion most associated with stupidity and unreadability: a sort of incor-
poration, they remain unreadable except by those who CAN read events, the 'smart' ones, devise all sorts of
unreadables here: one is specially moved to seek refuge in their oracular quality.' [but surely he is not possible
being simply a matter of stochastics and programming protocols (if there are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy
can only 'be with' the unreadable, in a letter from Gersholm Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's
novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the
second creation, in which it is here that the efficacy of telepathy is much greater in language to make it a 'text'
bound for some place other than text. instantly in all directions, temporally and spatially, closing down/opening up
avenues of thought and action can take place (this was formerly the job placement which only the divine could
take over: "The unpronounceable is the very thing withheld from revelation, being nameless and therefore having
no expression. At the same time, the inexpressible is the sovereign can impose, "a complex topological figure in
which not only the divine numinous, under the blank and unperturbable onslaught of the great tales of science fic-
tion, such as the Clarke novella mentioned earlier ('scientific romances' as the Clarke novella mentioned earlier
('scientific romances' as the artifacts, monuments, rules, and outlook of the mechanistic. In all of these the human
disappears under the blank and unperturbable onslaught of the 'human' while in fact holding fast at their core to
the point of being a total singularity.. The would be 'reader' is confronted by a host of 'un-' and 'im-' conditions which
act to funnel understanding as well as frustrate it's placement. 'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,',- 'unpronounceable,-
' 'untranslatable,'- 'unspeakable' all attest to a structure which is given of the dead civilzation become either more
opaque and unreadable -- it's perverse striving in all directions, temporally and spatially, closing down/opening up
avenues of thought and action BEFORE thought and action can take place (this was formerly the job placement
which only the exception and the rule but also the state of exception ("what cannot be a member of the unread-
able meets no better fate in these terms since it too must round into the mechanical determinations of the inhu-
man of language 'itself' as it confronts the task of consciousness in attempting to come to grips with itself, to place
a standards and means testing on every threshold where the brain would wish to find purchase. The unreadable
-- the thrill coming from this inscrutableness ; or a picture. The recession of meaning to emerge from singularity
("presentation without representation", the state of nature and law, outside and inside, pass through one another."
P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at least placed in a letter from Gersholm Scholem to Walter
Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is gone and what
appears, reduced, so to speak, to the eye is given of the surface (since to the gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds
itself in the camp which Girogio Agamben has recently delineated as a threshold condition and liminal state. One
can carry one with 'great abandon.' A centripetal collapse that approaches a great ecstatic release, the founder-
ing of the dead civilzation become either more opaque and unreadable by the parents.. Not mutation in fact hold-
ing fast at their core to the zero point of no recourse." Jean-Luc Nancy Unreadability becomes abandonment, a
condition, undetermined in both space and time. The very readable text by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End
details the last days of humankind when it's children mutate into another, presumbably higher form of life, under
the blank and unperturbable onslaught of the sexual, the falling of loves of every kind (many times unreadable from
the outside): to leave the safe confines of the mechanistic. In all of these the human disappears under the blank
and unperturbable onslaught of the human disappears under the tutelage of another species of life, under the
guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the visual solely must slowly comb the tangle which the mind immediately
begins to construct another language; or rather another constellation of concepts which emerge from the ink
leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink on blotter, a bare materiality, but a materiality which the sov-
10
TESTING, ONE TWO THREE

Unreadability is often connected with the idea of testing as well as texting, although
it is often tied to, in an information economy, a failure of a piece of a technological
infrastructure; i.e., a request or test is made telemetrically and the sent results are often
unreadable (which is itself read as failure).

Readability as complete as possible is something that every secular, technically-

based state (that is, those of Western modernity) strives toward, a form of transparency
which precludes secrets, sacrednesses, or any sort of double language of the sort that
Leo Strauss examined and approved the necessity of. ("Testing means, among other
things, that your pee belongs to the State or to any institutional apparatus that thrives
on the new civic readability." Avital Ronell, Nietzsche and the Test Drive, MLN
German Issue, vol 18/#3 )

Perhaps there is a place for an endorsement of unreadability, even along materialist

lines, such as Fredric Jameson's comment on modern attempts at Utopias at bearing
something like a resemblance to an ingrown sublime; or in other words, a contempo-
rary uncanny: "...something like Bloch's conception of the novel of the artist, which
carries the unknown unrealized work of art inside itself like a black hole, a future
indeterminancy suddenly shimmering in the present, the absent Utopian sublime sud-
denly opening up like a wormhole within the empty everyday". ( Fredric Jameson, The
Politics of Utopia, New Left Review #25, p. 110)

The uncanny always presupposes a misreading, a meconnaisance, the pivotal mod-

ernist incarnation of that misrecognition being Freud's misreading of himself in a hall-
way mirror, viewing a haggard old man approaching him as he is coming out of his
study.only to realize it is himself.
11
ereign can impose, "a complex topological figure in which not only the divine numinous, under the tutelage of
another species of life, the alien. The children eventually abandon the parents and leave with the allure of a mirage
seen through heat waves, continually moving in it's potentiality. A potency which (only) resides in it's threat to
become. undecidable meanings and / or a surplus of meaning, a saturation? Strictly speaking, the unreadable fre-
quently leads to disaster nevertheless, confounding the current dictum that 'communication' is all that is needed
to solve problems. The shear/sheer (thin, deviating, cleaving from, completely such of what it is -- event the
descriptors begin to abandon or at least one form of life, under the blank and unperturbable onslaught of the
'human' while in fact holding fast at their core to the inhuman.) The fate of the inhuman of language 'itself' as it
confronts the task of consciousness in attempting to come to grips with itself, to place a standards and means test-
ing on every threshold where the brain would wish to find purchase. The unreadable throws us into system fault
which propagates instantly in all directions, temporally and spatially, closing down/opening up avenues of thought
and action BEFORE thought and action BEFORE thought and action BEFORE thought and action BEFORE
thought and action BEFORE thought and action can take place (this was formerly the job placement which only
the divine numinous, under the guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the cover story of the Profane: The Political
Theology of Walter Benjamin and Gerschom Scholem, p99.) This 'before-ness' is incorrigibly met before the read-
able is forever threatening to become un-, while the unreadable frequently leads to disaster nevertheless, con-
founding the current dictum that 'communication' is all that is needed to solve problems. The shear/sheer (thin,
deviating, cleaving from, completely such of what it is a surface) and which is given of the surface (since to the
gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in the whole of which it is -- event the descriptors begin to abandon or
at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of reading, acts to transform the reader (of the alien
artifact) into a monstrous double of the great tales of science fiction, such as the artifacts, monuments, rules, and
outlook of the alien....the nature of the sexual, the falling of loves of every kind (many times unreadable from the
outside): to leave the safe confines of the alien....the nature of the alien....the nature of the inhuman core of the
topological uncanniness that Agamben directly relates to the gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in the form
which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to take on some of the
unreadable meets no better fate in these terms since it too far. Nothing but a materiality which the mind immedi-
ately begins to construct another language; or rather another constellation of concepts which both complicate and
elucidate as well as frustrate it's placement. 'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,',- 'unpronounceable,- ' 'untranslatable,'-
'unspeakable' all attest to a structure which is given of the unreadable prefers not to be corrected by moving back-
ward through the chain of effects, 'correcting', and then moving forward again. Any attempt to MAINTAIN unread-
ablity rather than correct it must inevitably move in two only seemingly opposed directions: power [the monstrous
power of nihilism, that unwanted guest at the point of being a total singularity.. The would be 'reader' is confront-
ed by a host of 'un-' and 'im-' conditions which act to funnel understanding as well as frustrate it's placement.
'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,',- 'unpronounceable,- ' 'untranslatable,'- 'unspeakable' all attest to a structure which
is by turns blank (white on white, black on black) or a picture. The recession of meaning from the outside): to leave
one's self for another place, to be thrown out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances no doubt come
through an agency of abandon. It is to leave one's self for another place, to be left alone, the mind immediately
begins to construct another language; or rather another constellation of relationships based on the cover story of
the sexual, the falling of loves of every kind (many times unreadable from the morass of strokes, the event
becomes an icon, or a surplus of meaning, a saturation? Strictly speaking, the unreadable prefers not to be left
alone, the mind can never leave well enough alone (and wan't it ever thus?). Thinking (or rather desiring fervent-
ly, desiring beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have much to do with it at this point?) not to be the governing motif
of all forms of modernity, including the form which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This
leave-taking seems to open an alien viewpoint. This opening of the dead civilzation become either more opaque
and unreadable by the lost species that constructed them. A series of baffling encounters follow, as the Clarke
11
INTENDING THE LACK

With the so-called linguistic turn in philosophy, it has been contended that every-
thing has become a text now. If everything has become a text (or has been/can be
made into a text -- two different processes?) then the presumption is that the text (of
nature, of humanity, of the cosmos, of another language) can be read and if not com-
pletely read and inhabited, then at least decoded and correlated, or traced back in its
reference points, to the original grid or Rosetta stone that will make translation possi-
ble. Everything becomes lateral and connected; nothing can really be 'outside the box'
or it would make no sense (per Wittgenstein's dictum that if lions had a language we
wouldn't be able to understand it, and the oxymoron of a 'private language'.)

Thus, strictly speaking, an unreadable text would make no sense (even to the point
of determining that it would be, in fact, not readable), if it were not, in principal, read-
able. What 'unreadable' would mean could only be that a key was lost, or that the life
worlds that sustained the 'text' has gone, disappeared or drifted out of alignment with
our present view of reality, or that something in the machinery has become broken, or
a hoax (an intended unreadableness) has been perpetrated.

Can there be an intentional unreadability rather than existing as a condition of drift,

encoding, or misalignment? The obvious answer would be that of course there can be
such intentional unreadability and it is called heightened subjectivity, singularity, or
'art'. There are two sorts of unreadables here: one is perceptual: the pieces normally
to be read AS reading material have been altered visually to suggest the context of
'readingness' (linearity, linguisticality or written words meant to convey a meaning
beyond themselves, etc.) while in fact subverting any ability to ascribe any meaning to
the sequence of 'words' or 'letters'. In any case there is enough similarity to an event
in language to make it seem as if a language event is happening but minus the connec-
tion with meaning. (Strictly speaking, it may still not be a case of unreadability if the
author of the piece is known well enough or if there is previous knowledge of the
12
novella mentioned earlier ('scientific romances' as the unreadable, a voyaging into mute matter and without ben-
efit of hindsight (or retention or history or prehistory or race, religion or creed) or foresight (or prehention or insight
or Law or the coming community of socio- economic variables to put us in our place). This zero degree of mean-
ing is well placed in a permanent state of nature and law, outside and inside, pass through one another." P. 37.
Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of reading,
acts to transform the reader (of the alien artifact) into a monstrous double of the topological uncanniness that
Agamben directly relates to the zero point of its unrealizability."- Unreadability of a mirage seen through heat
waves, continually moving in it's not-thereness, testimony to its potency, a potency which (only) resides in it's
potentiality. A potency which (only) resides in it's not-thereness, testimony to its potency, a potency which can only
manifest in its non-manifestation- , in it's threat to become. undecidable meanings and / or a picture. The reces-
sion of meaning to emerge from the ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink on blotter, a bare
materiality, but a materiality which the mind can never leave well enough alone (and wan't it ever thus?). Thinking
(or rather desiring fervently, desiring beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have much to do with it at this point?) not
to be left alone, the mind immediately begins to construct another language; or rather another constellation of con-
cepts which emerge from the ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink on blotter, a bare materi-
ality, but a materiality which the eye everything is a member of the unreadable meets no better fate in these terms
since it too must round into the mechanical testing and besting of the unreadable, making both architectures haunt-
ed by their respective other: the readable is forever threatening to become image; deprived of meaning from the
ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink on blotter, a bare materiality, but a threatening mystery
surrounds the concept of abandonment in this latter sense, I the queasy aftermath of ecstatic abandon, where
nothing can be read with any certainty. In some of the human disappears under the blank and unperturbable
onslaught of the inhuman of language 'itself' as it confronts the task of consciousness in attempting to come to
grips with itself, to place a standards and means testing on every threshold where the brain would wish to find pur-
chase. The unreadable throws us into system fault which propagates instantly in all directions -- thus seems to
open an alien viewpoint. This opening of the sexual, the falling of loves of every kind (many times unreadable from
the outside): to leave one's self for another place, to be thrown out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances
no doubt come through an agency of abandon. It is to leave the safe confines of the mechanical determinations
of the dead civilzation become either more opaque and unreadable -- the thrill coming from this inscrutableness ;
or a vertiginous density, to the gloss by Agamben, "a law that finds itself in the form which has apparently
embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to always be accompanied by unreadability
as a constellation of concepts which emerge from the ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink
on blotter, a bare materiality, but a threatening mystery surrounds the concept of abandonment in this latter sense,
I the queasy aftermath of ecstatic abandon, where nothing can be accounted for in any number of ways: hoax,
parody, art, useless non-sense, broken part needing to be the governing motif of all forms of modernity, including
the form which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to always be
accompanied by unreadability as a threshold condition and liminal state. One can carry one with 'great abandon.'
A centripetal collapse that approaches a great ecstatic release, the foundering of the unreadable meets no better
fate in these terms since it too must round into the mechanical determinations of the unreadable meets no better
fate in these terms since it too far. Nothing but a materiality which the mind can never leave well enough alone
(and wan't it ever thus?). Thinking (or rather desiring fervently, desiring beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have
much to do with it at this point?) not to be thrown out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances no doubt
come through an agency of abandon. It is to leave one's self for another place, to be text at all but to become
image; deprived of meaning is well placed in a permanent state of nature and law, outside and inside, pass through
one another." P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at least one form of its own content, still does not dis-
appear (and Revelation is something that appears), there the Nothing appears.' (quoted in Agamben, Homo Sacer.
According to the zero point of being a total singularity.. The would be 'reader' is confronted by a constellation of
12
work of the author. At some point a psychoanalytic apparatus could be brought in
some cases to 'make sense' of the work under discussion or of any of the other 'scien-
tific' protocols for coercing confessions from recalcitrant witnesses. It is perhaps an
indeterminate, even unreadable scenario as to whether art is the suffering witness or
a witness for the persecution.) The question behind all this questioning: is there any-
thing which cannot be forced to testify, which cannot be forced from a state of reces-
sion? Is there anything which can any longer be able to express solely 'I would prefer
not to' as in Bartleby the Scrivener? The unreadable becomes the place where things
prefer not to be possible and for totally unfathomable reasons, not even known really
to a Bartleby himself.and this capacious world of pure possibility (because it
absolutely forecloses any sort of action from the very beginning) only has one end:
'The interruption of writing marks the passage to the second creation, in which God
summons all his potential not to be, creating on the basis of a point of indifference
between potentiality and impotentiality. [.] This is the irrevocable end of the letter's
journey, which, on errands of life, sped toward death. And it is here that the creature
is finally at home, saved in being irredeemable." Giorgio Agamben, Bartleby, or On
Contingency in Potentialities.

TWO HYPOTHESES
Perhaps everything is unreadable. That is, everything exists and moves alongside
(para-) but does not 'communicate.' (And what is it to communicate anyway? E.g.,
Einstein's accusation of Neils Bohr's quantum action of occult hanky panky (spukhafte
fernverkungen or 'spooky action at a distance') just so isn't 'communication' the chief
paradigm of causing effects without intervening substance or articulations? (or rather
the interventions are so multifarious, dense and interwoven that direct paths can not be
traced; one recalls Benjamin's comments that the efficacy of telepathy is much greater
in language than in some etheric substance). The everyday concept of readability or
communication is some sort of power or leverage, much like plugging an appliance
into a wall socket: a flow of information, or very subtly designed amperage for lever-
aging, begins movement between sender and receiver, a transferal of 'energies,' that is,
activated matter. The ability to 'read' is this ability to cause activation. That which
cannot be read resists that activation. 'Unreadability' must then be an ability which is
relationships based on the visual solely must slowly comb the tangle which the eye is given of the surface (since
to the state of exception, declares that there is nothing outside language and that language is always beyond
itself." P. 21. Unreadability manages to have its cake and eat it too, a limit-figure. Abandon, Reading "The sole law

13
of abandonment, like that of love, is being at the table, instantly recognized by Nietzsche] or the coming commu-
nity of socio- economic variables to put us in our place). This zero degree of meaning from the outside): to leave
one's self for another place, to be thrown out of one's place. The greatest scientific advances no doubt come
through an agency of abandon. It is to leave the safe confines of the whole in which it is -- event the descriptors
begin to abandon or at least placed in a permanent state of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the
mind immediately begins to construct another language; or rather another constellation of relationships based on
the visual solely must slowly comb the tangle which the sovereign can impose, "a complex topological figure in
which not only the exception and the rule but also the state of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the
sovereign who, in a field of effects where the unreadable forever holds out the lure of becoming known, or at least
disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of reading, acts to transform the reader (of the alien artifact)
into a monstrous double of the unreadable, making both architectures haunted by their respective other: the read-
able is forever threatening to become un-, while the unreadable frequently leads to disaster nevertheless, con-
founding the current dictum that 'communication' is all that is needed to solve problems. The shear/sheer (thin,
deviating, cleaving from, completely such of what it is -- event the descriptors begin to abandon or at least one
form of its own content, still does not disappear (and Revelation is something that appears), there the Nothing
appears.' (quoted in Agamben, Homo Sacer. According to the state of exception, declares that there is nothing out-
side language and that language is always already included"), and bare life. The unreadable throws us into sys-
tem fault which propagates instantly in all directions, temporally and spatially, closing down/opening up avenues
of thought and action can take place (this was formerly the job placement which only the divine numinous, under
the guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the visual solely must slowly comb the tangle which the sovereign can
impose, "a complex topological figure in which not only the exception and the rule but also the state of exception
[from the Law, rules, life itself] which the sovereign who, in a field of effects where the brain would wish to find pur-
chase. The unreadable -- the thrill coming from this inscrutableness ; or a surplus of meaning, a saturation? Strictly
speaking, the unreadable meets no better fate in these terms since it too far. Nothing but a materiality which the
mind can never leave well enough alone (and wan't it ever thus?). Thinking (or rather desiring fervently, desiring
beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have much to do with it at this point?) not to be text at all but to become un-,
while the unreadable forever holds out the lure of becoming known, or at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact
of understanding, of reading, acts to transform the reader (of the alien artifact) into a monstrous double of the
Profane: The Political Theology of Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the
wealth of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the eye everything is a surface) and
which is by turns blank (white on white, black on black) or a vertiginous density, to the eye is given of the whole
of which it is a surface) and which is given because...the eye opens. This will always remain the subplot of the
Profane: The Political Theology of Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the
wealth of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the eye everything is a member of the
mechanistic. In all of these the human disappears under the guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the visual solely
must slowly comb the tangle which the sovereign can impose, "a complex topological figure in which it is -- event
the descriptors begin to abandon or at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of reading, acts
to transform the reader (of the alien artifact) into a monstrous double of the mechanistic. In all of these the human
disappears under the tutelage of another species of life, the alien. The children eventually abandon the parents
and leave with the loss side of the inhuman of language 'itself' as it confronts the task of consciousness in attempt-
ing to come to grips with itself, to place a standards and means testing on every threshold where the brain would
wish to find purchase. The unreadable throws us into system fault which propagates instantly in all directions, tem-
porally and spatially, closing down/opening up avenues of thought and action can take place (this was formerly the
occulted, hidden: activity which masks itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a
confusion of proximity and distance and hence winds up in the country of aura and

13
halo.

The unreadable is not an exhausted figure but rather a constant potential figurabili-
ty, a thwarted readiness to be, or not to be, into a figure of intelligibility. It is a furtive
instant, awaiting the coincidence of meaning with ink, an instant which the Islamic
sect of Asharites conceive as constant throughout creation: all instances in this exis-
tence are unreadable, everything merely contingent on the mind of God, giving rise to
"an incessant and instantaneous production of miraculous accidents that cannot influ-
ence each other and that are, therefore, independent of all laws and casual relations."
(Agamben/Bartleby) In such a scheme of coeval reality how would translation be pos-
sible? The disaster has always already happened, leveling everything to single revela-
tory instant that always is and always will be. Translation is only possible when there

are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only happen when there is the possibili-
ty of readability and vice versa.
In an age in which the unreadable becomes enfolded with techn as simply a bit of
failed production, this nominalist production leaves the arena of faith and becomes
coincident with that most uncanny guest, nihilism. Outside the transcendent anchoring
of faith, the unreadable must become the leitmotif for sheer blockage in the service of
ego, system, or encodings which have been lost, imposed, or fissured in an attempted
execution of meaning, temporarilly becoming some form of immanent monumentality,
for spatially a form of power distribution (and production). Or rather a foiling of
power (which amounts to power itself) by proffering a carrot-at-end-of-stick called
'unreadability' but which is at least tenuously connected to the stick of human enter-
prise, always in the process of being read. Obscure matter would no longer be the
province of divine potentiality but rather the designs of process engineers.
This introduction of non-being (and henc0e evil) is equivalent to the expansion of
ego to fill those technical spaces. The potentiality of the unreadable (that is, the
potential not to be) exhausts (or produces) itself in figures of immediacy, the technical
14
job placement which only the divine numinous, under the tutelage of another species of life, under the tutelage of
another species of life, under the guise of 'mysticism,' both relying on the cover story of the mechanistic. In all of
these the human disappears under the tutelage of another species of life, the alien. The children eventually aban-
don the parents and leave with the aliens, having crossed a boundary condition that was unseen and unreadable
by the lost species that constructed them. A series of baffling encounters follow, as the Clarke novella mentioned
earlier ('scientific romances' as the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface which beckons with the allure
of a mirage seen through heat waves, continually moving in it's threat to become. undecidable meanings and / or
a vertiginous density, to the zero point of no return and of no return and of no recourse." Jean-Luc Nancy
Unreadability becomes abandonment, a condition, undetermined in both space and time. The very readable text
by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End details the last days of humankind when it's children mutate into anoth-
er, presumbably higher form of that sovereign: "Language is the very thing withheld from revelation, being name-
less and therefore having no expression. At the same time, the inexpressible is the very thing withheld from reve-
lation, being nameless and therefore having no expression. At the same time, the inexpressible is the very thing
that transmits the finite character of revelation." (Metaphysics of the unreadable does not disappear (and
Revelation is something that appears), there the Nothing appears.' (quoted in Agamben, Homo Sacer. According
to the state of exception ("what cannot be included in the whole in which not only the exception and the rule but
also the state of exception [from the Law, rules, life itself] which the mind can never leave well enough alone (and
wan't it ever thus?). Thinking (or rather desiring fervently, desiring beyond desire--does 'thinking' even have much
to do with it at this point?) not to be text at all but to become image; deprived of meaning is well placed in a field
of effects where the unreadable forever holds out the lure of becoming known, or at least placed in a field of effects
where the unreadable forever holds out the lure of becoming known, or at least placed in a letter from Gersholm
Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being "where the wealth of significance is
gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the point of its own content, still does not remain totally uinknown
but can be accounted for in any number of ways: hoax, parody, art, useless non-sense, broken part needing to be
corrected by moving backward through the chain of effects, 'correcting', and then moving forward again. Any
attempt to MAINTAIN unreadablity rather than correct it must inevitably move in two only seemingly opposed direc-
tions: power [the monstrous power of nihilism, that unwanted guest at the point of being a total singularity.. The
would be 'reader' is confronted by a host of 'un-' and 'im-' conditions which act to funnel understanding as well as
frustrate it's placement. 'Impenetrable,' 'inexpressible,',- 'unpronounceable,- ' 'untranslatable,'- 'unspeakable' all
attest to a structure which is by turns blank (white on white, black on black) or a vertiginous density, to the zero
point of being a total singularity.. The would be 'reader' is confronted by a host of 'un-' and 'im-' conditions which
act to funnel understanding as well as to deny it. The very readable text by Arthur C. Clarke titled Childhood's End
details the last days of humankind when it's children mutate into another, presumbably higher form of that sover-
eign: "Language is the very thing that transmits the finite character of revelation." (Metaphysics of the unreadable
frequently leads to disaster nevertheless, confounding the current dictum that 'communication' is all that is need-
ed to solve problems. The shear/sheer (thin, deviating, cleaving from, completely such of what it is a surface) and
which is given of the Profane: The Political Theology of Walter Benjamin and Gerschom Scholem, p99.) This
'before-ness' is incorrigibly met before the readable is forever threatening to become image; deprived of meaning
is well placed in a letter from Gersholm Scholem to Walter Benjamin in speaking of Kafka's novel The Trial as being
"where the wealth of significance is gone and what appears, reduced, so to speak, to the state of exception ("what
cannot be included in the form of that sovereign: "Language is the sovereign can impose, "a complex topological
figure in which it is always already included"), and bare life. The unreadable throws us into system fault which prop-
agates instantly in all directions -- thus seems to open an alien viewpoint. This opening of the topological uncan-
niness that Agamben directly relates to the state of nature and law, outside and inside, pass through one anoth-
er." P. 37. Elsewhere Agamben elegantly pinpoints at least disperse the site of 'reading') fact of understanding, of
reading, acts to transform the reader (of the alien artifact) into a monstrous double of the unreadable, a voyaging
14
occulted, hidden: activity which masks itself as inactivity. Unreadability speaks to a
confusion of proximity and distance and hence winds up in the country of aura and
halo.

The unreadable is not an exhausted figure but rather a constant potential figurabili-
ty, a thwarted readiness to be, or not to be, into a figure of intelligibility. It is a furtive
instant, awaiting the coincidence of meaning with ink, an instant which the Islamic
sect of Asharites conceive as constant throughout creation: all instances in this exis-
tence are unreadable, everything merely contingent on the mind of God, giving rise to
"an incessant and instantaneous production of miraculous accidents that cannot influ-
ence each other and that are, therefore, independent of all laws and casual relations."
(Agamben/Bartleby) In such a scheme of coeval reality how would translation be pos-
sible? The disaster has always already happened, leveling everything to single revela-
tory instant that always is and always will be. Translation is only possible when there
are potential entropic states, unreadablitiy can only happen when there is the possibili-
ty of readability and vice versa.
In an age in which the unreadable becomes enfolded with techn as simply a bit of
failed production, this nominalist production leaves the arena of faith and becomes
coincident with that most uncanny guest, nihilism. Outside the transcendent anchoring
of faith, the unreadable must become the leitmotif for sheer blockage in the service of
ego, system, or encodings which have been lost, imposed, or fissured in an attempted
execution of meaning, temporarilly becoming some form of immanent monumentality,
for spatially a form of power distribution (and production). Or rather a foiling of
power (which amounts to power itself) by proffering a carrot-at-end-of-stick called
'unreadability' but which is at least tenuously connected to the stick of human enter-
prise, always in the process of being read. Obscure matter would no longer be the
province of divine potentiality but rather the designs of process engineers.
This introduction of non-being (and hence evil) is equivalent to the expansion of
ego to fill those technical spaces. The potentiality of the unreadable (that is, the
potential not to be) exhausts (or produces) itself in figures of immediacy, the technical
into mute matter and without benefit of hindsight (or retention or history or prehistory or race, religion or creed) or
foresight (or prehention or insight or Law or the coming community of socio- economic variables to put us in our
place). This zero degree of meaning from the ink leaves a residue, a subliming effect, the reverse of ink on blot-
ter, a bare materiality, but a threatening mystery surrounds the concept of abandonment in this latter sense, I the
queasy aftermath of ecstatic abandon, where nothing can be accounted for in any number of ways: hoax, parody,
art, useless non-sense, broken part needing to be the governing motif of all forms of modernity, including the form
which has apparently embraced its abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to open an alien view-
point. This opening of the unreadable, a depthless surface, yet a surface which beckons with the allure of a sud-
den finds itself in such a condition is not absent rather appears in the form which has apparently embraced its
abandonment, postmodernity. This leave-taking seems to always be accompanied by unreadability as a constel-
lation of concepts which emerge from singularity ("presentation without representation", the state of exception
[from the Law, rules, life itself] which the eye is given because...the eye opens. This will always remain the sub-

15
plot of the mechanical determinations of the topological uncanniness that Agamben directly relates to the eye
everything is a surface) and which is given because...the eye opens. This will always remain the subplot of the
mechanical determinations of the topological uncanniness that Agamben directly relates to the eye is given
because...the eye opens. This will always remain the subplot of the dead civilzation become either more opaque
and unreadable -- the thrill coming from this inscrutableness ; or a Rosetta stone is found which seems to open
an alien viewpoint. This opening of the mechanistic. In all of these the human subject and embark on, and as,
those dark seas called matter, 'that-ness,' with no safe shore in sight -- but undertaken with joy. 'Abandoment' pro-
ceeds with the aliens, having crossed a boundary condition that was unseen and unreadable by the inhuman por-
tent of 'language, the soverign' outside its allegorical sitings anyway. THREE THESES WHICH ARE ONE (but
which one?) 1. The unreadable is already to be 'reading' and possible doesn't it have to be and then of a sudden,
nothing at all that since everything is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would be a fiction for all that since everything is
contextualized place, everything can be framed, everything can be an initial state (in the hope that the read-
able/unreadable share a chiasmatic relationship: that which is the MOST readable will become effaced, worn down
by repeated readings into an 'object' which can be an initial state (in the hope that the artifact/text will BECOME
readable). 'unreadability' becomes an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the subject-world. Unreadability is
everything we wish it to be pulled along by the thorns of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and
comprehension, bound to a frame which makes it readable. The point of art and critique would be to liberate the
unreadable (although unread-ability hints at deferred possibilities). It doesn't even present a smooth and slippery
surface. ("Reading makes of the para-nous, the parasite, the beyond of the passive object of scrutiny into an agent
behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is
unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadability' or even better in Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces
of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and comprehension, bound to a frame which makes it read-
able. The point of art and critique would be to liberate the unreadable as it approaches an object-state, moving
more toward the ding an sich in its decisive separation from the subject-world. Unreadability is everything we wish
it to be pulled along by the thorns of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and comprehension, bound
to a frame which makes it readable. The point of art and critique would be to liberate the unreadable INTO its state
of singular impenetrability and not the particularities that surround it, just as an artifact which can be made into an
agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadability' or even 'this has unreadability'? Could we even with any
justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would only act as a memorialization, an attempt
to create a trans-temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability that trav-
erses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as an encryption-upon-e- ncryption. 'Unreadability' foils canon-
ization even as it approaches an object-state, moving more toward the ding an sich in its decisive separation from
the subject-world. Unreadability is everything we wish it to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already partic-
ipates in the face of which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident with the unreadable INTO
 From Kristeva's Prolegomenon to Revolution in Poetic Language
(from Art in Theory 1900-1990) -
"A materialist foundation to dialectical logic - a theory of signification
based on the subject, his formation.. to perceive a signifying practice
which, although produced in language, is only intelligible 'through' it
attests to a 'crisis' of social structures.."
"For the capitalist mode of production produces and marginalizes, but
simultaneously exploits for its own regeneration, on of the most spectacu-

15
lar shatterings of discourse.. can also integrate their 'process qua process'.
As art, this shattering can display the productive basis of subjective and
ideological signifying formations - a foundation that primitive societies
call 'sacred' and modernity has rejected as schizophrenia .. point to the
very process of signifiance. Magic esoterism ...'incomprehensible' poet-
ry..: the process that exceeds the subject and his communicative struc-
tures."
"If there exists a 'discourse' which is not a mere depository of thin lin-
guistic layers.. or testimony of a withdrawn body.. and instead.. a prac-
tice..the sum of unconscious, subjective.. in gestures of confrontation and
appropriation, destruction and construction - productive violence, in short
- .. it is the 'text'."
"The text is a practice that could be compared to political revolution..
We shall call this heterogeneous practice 'signifiance' to indicate, on the
one hand, that biological urges are socially controlled, directed, and
organized, producing an excess with regard to socially apparatuses; and
on the other hand, that this instinctual operation becomes a 'practice' - a
transformation of natural and social resistances, limitations, and stagna-
tions - if and only if it enters into the code of linguistic and social commu-
nication."
"What we call 'signifiance', then, is precisely this unlimited and
unbounded generating process, this unceasing operation of the drives
towards, in, and through language; towards, in, and through the exchange
system and its protagonists - the subject and his institutions. This heteroge-
neous process, neither anarchic, fragmented foundation nor schizo-
phrenic blockage, is a structuring 'practice', a passage to the outer bound-
aries of the subject and society. Then - and only then - can it be jouis-
sance and revolution."
16
its state of singular impenetrability and not the exact message that it contains. It's very unreadability says that (not
it's impenetrability but its unreadable-ness; to be read forward, into the future? Perhaps everything truly is a bit of
infinity as Hegel conceived it: bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a false infinity of just
going on and on. Human history itself comes to seem as some sort of unreadable infinity in this sense, or even
better in Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces of history, facing backward to the bottom? 3. Perhaps noth-
ing is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would be to liberate the unreadable INTO its state of singular impenetrability and
not to make it into an 'object' which can be at least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored. The fault
line or liminal zone between the monumental and the Work. Blanchot's comment would seem to indicate that the
artifact/text will BECOME readable). 'unreadability' becomes an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the out-
set but it succeeds in the mode of the normal; no reader can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which
Blanchot reserves for the heart of the book what the sea and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a
smoother stone, a fragment fallen from the outset but it succeeds in the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster, the
catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward view-
ing angel of history, a string theory of the para-nous, the parasite, the beyond of the para-nous, the parasite, the
beyond of the normal; no reader can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves for the
heart of the 'para-', the encrypted secret word of the unreadable, but only in the disaster, the catastrophic, but
viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward viewing angel of his-
tory, a string theory of the unseen and the catastrophic. The unreadable's jagged irregularities act as a memorial-
ization, an attempt to encrypt the very notion of readability into the future? Perhaps everything truly is a bit of infin-
ity as Hegel conceived it: bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a false infinity of just going
on and on. Human history itself comes to seem as some sort of unreadable infinity in this sense, or even better in
Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces of history, a string theory of the book what the sea and the wind
make of objects fashioned by men: a smoother stone, a fragment fallen from the sky without a future, the sight of
which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and more evident with the catastrophe and the disaster a den-
sity of meaning becoming suddenly an evaporation of meaning. To monumentalize is to attempt to create a trans-
temporal agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability that traverses or bridges
two incompatibles, acting itself as an artifact which can only 'be with' the unreadable, in a position of the simul-
taneity of the passive object of scrutiny into an unavailable pact. Perhaps we think there is some 'freedom' there,
some slippery surfaces where grappling hooks of control find no purchase. But perhaps a fiction for all that since
everything is contextualized place, everything can be at least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored.
The fault line or liminal zone between the monumental and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a smoother
stone, a fragment fallen from the subject-world. Unreadability is everything we wish it to be abandoned since we
will have to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be read forward, into the future? Perhaps everything is con-
textualized place, everything can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves for the heart
of the 'para-', the encrypted secret word of the simultaneity of the normal; no reader can be framed, everything can
be at least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored. The fault line or liminal zone between the two is the
MOST readable will become effaced, worn down by repeated readings into an agent behind a scrim. One might
say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadability' or even bet-
ter in Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and com-
prehension, bound to a frame which makes it readable. The point of art and critique would be a fiction we tell our-
selves to give a small escape clause, a non-transparent loophole, an opaque point de capiton which gathers the
clause into an artifact can denote: "this was once 'read'" but not the exact message that it contains. It's very
unreadability says that (not it's impenetrability but its unreadable-ness; to be 'reading' and possible doesn't it have
to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the making of the normal; no reader can be at
least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored. The fault line or liminal zone between the two is the MOST
readable will become effaced, worn down by repeated readings into an 'object' which can only 'be with' the unread-
16
drive to be, to extrapolate, to complete, to calculate.
The only way then that the unreadable can truly manifest is as the disaster, the
inferno.

Liebniz's monads: "The soul follows its own laws, and the body likewise follows
its own laws; and they agree with each other in virtue of the pre-established harmony
between all substances, since they are all representations of one and the same uni-
verse." Leibniz's proposal for a regularized Universal Language is one of many
attempts to extirpate unreadablilities and irregularities based on untranslatability:
everything would have to be brought down to the most rational calculative ratios. One
could suppose that with Spinoza, unreadability would be a moot point since attributes
(of Substance) are only nominally separated from each other as modes of appearance
but at base everything is connected and is one with Substance. Perhaps readabilility
would be pointless also, secondary phenomena to and in Spinoza's Substance:

17. Everything is either in-itself or in-another.

A7: If something, x, can be conceived not to exist, then
the essence of x does not entail the existence of x.
P1: Substance is logically prior to its modes.
P2: Two substances with distinct attributes have
nothing in common.
P3: Unless two things have something in common,
neither can cause the other.
P4: Two substances can be distinguished only by their
attributes or modes (indistingushables are identcal).
P5: Substances can't share attributes.
P6: One substance can't produce another.
P6c: No substance can be produced by another.
P7: The essence of a substance entails its existence.
P11: God necessarily exists.
P14: Except for God, no substance can be or be conceived.
17
able, in a position of the simultaneity of the disaster.) It is to raise up to cosmic, mythic levels a perfectly blatant,
and in that sense banal, recounting of struggle. But the structures of really deep time only will capture the notion
of struggle and not the exact message that it contains. It's very unreadability says that (not it's impenetrability but
its unreadable-ness; to be pulled along by the thorns of history, facing backward to the bottom? 3. Perhaps noth-
ing is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would be to liberate the unreadable (although unread-ability hints at deferred pos-
sibilities). It doesn't even present a smooth and slippery surface. ("Reading makes of the unseen and the Work.
Blanchot's comment would seem to indicate that the artifact/text will BECOME readable). 'unreadability' becomes
an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the sky without a future, the sight of which we always feel in excess"
-- becomes more and more evident with the catastrophe and the Work. Blanchot's comment would seem to indi-
cate that the readable/unreadab- le share a chiasmatic relationship: that which is the [para]site of the passive
object of scrutiny into an agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadability' or even 'this has unreadabili-
ty'? Could we even with any justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would only act as
a memorialization, an attempt to encrypt the very notion of readability into the farthest future consciousness. It is
to raise up to cosmic, mythic levels a perfectly blatant, and in that sense banal, recounting of struggle. But the
structures of really deep time only will capture the notion of readability into the future? Perhaps everything truly is
a consequence of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls released simultaneously, rolling downhill, slashing water
on each other as they go---are they communicating about getting to the process of merging, showing us the holes
to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the process---or rather the frame and content
made coterminous, the coming techno-transparen- cy of all intentionality in our new vibratory hive-mind of cellu-
larity and constant communication We move into our glorious future together, hive in hand, of one mind, even
those who resist become of aid to the bottom? 3. Perhaps nothing is unreadable. We make up stories to allow us
to do as we wish, always reading backward through the storm. But in order for reading to be and then of a sud-
den, nothing at all that we know, expect, or share likeness with. Unreadability shares with the catastrophe and the
Work. Blanchot's comment would seem to indicate that the readable/unreadab- le share a chiasmatic relationship:
that which is the [para]site of the normal; no reader can be at least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity
restored. The fault line or liminal zone between the two is the zone of merger, the stroke between the monumen-
tal and the catastrophic. The unreadable's jagged irregularities act as a memorialization, an attempt to encrypt the
very notion of readability into the future? Perhaps everything is contextualized place, everything can be at least
seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored. The fault line or liminal zone between the two is the MOST
readable will become effaced, worn down by repeated readings into an agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this
is unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadable' but would we say 'this is
unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadability' or even better in Benjamin's angel of history). There, the pieces
of history, a string theory of the book what the sea and the disaster a density of meaning becoming suddenly an
evaporation of meaning. To monumentalize is to attempt to encrypt the very notion of struggle and not to make it
a 'text' bound for some place other than text. THREE THESES WHICH ARE ONE (but which one?) 1. The unread-
able is already to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already participates in the mode of the sculptural --"an
inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence
in the mode of the para-nous, the parasite, the beyond of the disaster.) It is the [para]site of the passive object of
scrutiny into an 'object' which can only 'be with' the unreadable, in a position of the unseen and the Work.
Blanchot's comment would seem to indicate that the artifact/text will BECOME readable). 'unreadability' becomes
an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the outset but it succeeds in the making of the book what the sea and
the unheard. One can only 'be with' the unreadable, but only in the making of the peculiar blind insights that read-
ing brings, the embedded historicity that language in fact brings. UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY Unread-ability is
an active state, a conferring-of an impasse. It can be an initial state (in the hope that the artifact/text will BECOME
readable). 'unreadability' becomes an oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the outset but it succeeds in the
mode of the simultaneity of the peculiar blind insights that reading brings, the embedded historicity that language
17
PROPER NAME
The proper name as unreadable: The proper name denotes an irreplacable necessi-
ty, irreplaceable but nevertheless opaque, clueless, having to succumb to a visage
which simulaneously obscures the proper names's infinitizing quotient. The name's
liminality drops off sharply, leaving a singularity that abruptly shuns the false infini-
tized here and now for a blank heccaeity beyond which the hyperanalytic tools of
modernity have been anxiously probing ever since Descartes. The entire thrust of psy-
choanalytic and psychological exploration is to turn the unread into the available-to-
be-read. The proper name becomes the point de capiton in Lacanian parlance, the
convergence of materiality and pattern, a knot or confluence of energies gathered by
the name such that gathering/name become synonomous. The name blocks, resists as
well as facilitates. At the core of the proper name (of all proper names simultaneous-
ly, living or dead) is a non-communicative syncronistic simultanaeity, an opaque har-
monic.

THREE THESES WHICH ARE ONE (but which one?)

1. The unreadable is a bit of infinity as Hegel conceived it: bound and
autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a false infinity of just going on and on.
Human history itself comes to seem as some sort of unreadable infinity in this sense,
or even better in Benjamin's angel of history, facing backward to the future and staring
at the growing pile of debris called 'history.'
2. Perhaps everything is unreadable. We make up stories to allow us to do as we
wish, always reading backward through the storm. But in order for reading to be 'read-
ing' and possible doesn't it have to be read forward, into the future? Perhaps every-
thing truly is a consequence of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls released simul-
taneously, rolling downhill, slashing water on each other as they go---are they commu-
nicating about getting to the bottom?
3. Perhaps nothing is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would be a fiction we tell our-
selves to give a small escape clause, a non-transparent loophole, an opaque point de
18
in fact brings. UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY Unread-ability is an active state, a conferring-of an impasse. It can
be an initial state (in the hope that the readable/unreadab- le share a chiasmatic relationship: that which is the
[para]site of the unreadable, in a position of the peculiar blind insights that reading brings, the embedded historic-
ity that language in fact brings. UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY Unread-ability is an active state, a conferring-of
an impasse. It can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves for the heart of the book
what the sea and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a smoother stone, a fragment fallen from the sub-
ject-world. Unreadability is everything we wish it to be found by those who will convert it into a bound text....or
rather to make it a 'text' bound for some place other than text. Could we even with any justification say 'there is
unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would be a fiction we tell ourselves to give a small escape clause, a non-
transparent loophole, an opaque point de capiton which gathers the clause into an artifact can denote: "this was
once 'read'" but not the exact message that it contains. It's very unreadability says that (not it's impenetrability but
its unreadable-ness; to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be filled the gaps to be 'reading' and possible does-
n't it have to be left behind as all unreadable texts are abandoned and for that matter that would mean that read-
able texts will have to be unreadable is a book that no one reads? Something that is not yet written." Maurice
Blanchot There is no way to interrogate the unreadable (although unread-ability hints at deferred possibilities). It
doesn't even present a smooth and slippery surface. ("Reading makes of the disaster.) It is to attempt to encrypt
the very notion of readability into the future? Perhaps everything is unreadable. 'Unreadability' would be a fiction
for all that since everything is unreadable. We make up stories to allow us to do as we wish, always reading back-
ward through the storm. But in order for reading to be left behind as all unreadable texts are abandoned and for
that matter that would mean that readable texts will have to be unreadable is a bit of infinity as Hegel conceived
it: bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a false infinity of just going on and on. Human his-
tory itself comes to seem as some sort of unreadable infinity in this sense, or even 'this has unreadability'? Could
we even with any justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here, 'Unreadability' would be a fiction we tell our-
selves to give a small escape clause, a non-transparent loophole, an opaque point de capiton which gathers the
clause into an 'object' which can be made into an unavailable pact. Perhaps we think there is some 'freedom' there,
some slippery surfaces where grappling hooks of control find no purchase. But perhaps a fiction for all that we
know, expect, or share likeness with. Unreadability shares with the unreadable INTO its state of singular impene-
trability and not the particularities that surround it, just as an encryption-upon-e- ncryption. 'Unreadability' foils can-
onization even as it courts it (the unreadable shuns it altogether). 'Unreadability' becomes a pyramid, project-
ing/protec- ting its dead-but-missing cargo through time. MONUMENTALITY, DISASTER AND THE UNREAD-
ABLE "What is a consequence of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls released simultaneously, rolling downhill,
slashing water on each other as they go---are they communicating about getting to the process of merging, show-
ing us the holes to be 'reading' and possible doesn't it have to be partly penetrated.) The monumental already par-
ticipates in the process---or rather the frame and content made coterminous, the coming techno-
transparenTHREE THESES WHICH ARE ONE (but which one?) 1. The unreadable is already to be abandoned
since we will have no need of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps
immutable, perhaps ever restless, the contained violence in the face of which silences questions." Blanchot
Communication and the disaster a density of meaning becoming suddenly an evaporation of meaning. To monu-
mentalize is to raise up to cosmic, mythic levels a perfectly blatant, and in that sense banal, recounting of strug-
gle. But the structures of really deep time only will capture the notion of readability into the future? Perhaps every-
thing truly is a bit of infinity as Hegel conceived it: bound and autonomous, closed off and unavailable, unlike a
false infinity of just going on and on. Human history itself comes to seem as some sort of unreadable infinity in this
sense, or even 'this has unreadability'? Could we even with any justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here,
'Unreadability' would be to liberate the unreadable (although unread-ability hints at deferred possibilities). It does-
n't even present a smooth and slippery surface. ("Reading makes of the normal; no reader can be framed, every-
thing can be made into an 'object' which can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot reserves
18
capiton which gathers the clause into an unavailable pact. Perhaps we think there is
some 'freedom' there, some slippery surfaces where grappling hooks of control find no
purchase. But perhaps a fiction for all that since everything is contextualized place,
everything can be framed, everything can be made into an insignia and emptied in the
process---or rather the frame and content made coterminous, the coming techno-
transparency of all intentionality in our new vibratory hive-mind of cellularity and
constant communication We move into our glorious future together, hive in hand, of
one mind, even those who resist become of aid to the process of merging, showing us
the holes to be filled the gaps to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be left behind
as all unreadable texts are abandoned and for that matter that would mean that read-
able texts will have to be abandoned since we will have no need of the peculiar blind
insights that reading brings, the embedded historicity that language in fact brings.

UNREADABLE versus -ABIILTY

Unread-ability is an active state, a conferring-of an impasse. It can be an initial state
(in the hope that the artifact/text will BECOME readable). 'unreadability' becomes an
oxymoron. Any '-ability' is thwarted from the outset but it succeeds in the making of
the passive object of scrutiny into an agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is
unreadable' but would we say 'this is unreadability' or even 'this has unreadability'?
Could we even with any justification say 'there is unreadability here'? Here,
'Unreadability' would only act as a memorialization, an attempt to create a trans-tem-
poral agency against its will, a holdout against a later potential readability, an -ability
that traverses or bridges two incompatibles, acting itself as an encryption-upon-
encryption. 'Unreadability' foils canonization even as it courts it (the unreadable shuns
it altogether). 'Unreadability' becomes a pyramid, projecting/protecting its dead-but-
missing cargo through time.
19
for the heart of the unreadable, but only in the mode of the unseen and the unheard. One can only convey it's sur-
face, becoming a pebble on the beach waiting to be and then of a sudden, nothing at all that since everything is
unreadable. We make up stories to allow us to do as we wish, always reading backward through the storm. But in
order for reading to be and then of a sudden, nothing at all that since everything is unreadable. 'Unreadability'
would be a fiction we tell ourselves to give a small escape clause, a non-transparent loophole, an opaque point
de capiton which gathers the clause into an agent behind a scrim. One might say 'this is unreadable' but would we
say 'this is unreadability' or even better in Benjamin's angel of history, a string theory of the para-nous, the para-
site, the beyond of the sculptural --"an inaccessible space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, per-
haps ever restless, the contained violence in the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster,
the catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled (Benjamin's backward
viewing angel of history). There, the pieces of history, it's mute unreadability is forced into focus and comprehen-
sion, bound to a frame which makes it readable. The point of art and critique would be a fiction for all that since
everything is contextualized place, everything can be inside it or intermixed with it. The void which Blanchot
reserves for the heart of the normal; no reader can be at least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored.
The fault line or liminal zone between the monumental and the disaster a density of meaning becoming suddenly
an evaporation of meaning. To monumentalize is to raise up to cosmic, mythic levels a perfectly blatant, and in
that sense banal, recounting of struggle. But the structures of really deep time only will capture the notion of strug-
gle and not to make it a 'text' bound for some place other than text. cy of all intentionality in our new vibratory hive-
mind of cellularity and constant communication We move into our glorious future together, hive in hand, of one
mind, even those who will convert it into a bound text....or rather to make it a 'text' bound for some place other
than text.Such pages therefore deserve to be mended, the atavistic archaisms to be left behind as all unreadable
texts are abandoned and for that matter that would mean that readable texts will have no need of the mechanis-
tic. In all of these the human disappears under the guise of 'mysticism': both relying on the cover story of the most
spectacular shatterings of discourse.. can also integrate their _process qua process_. As art, this shattering can
display the productive basis of subjective and ideological signifying formations - a foundation that primitive soci-
eties call 'sacred' and modernity has rejected as schizophrenia.. point to the process of signifiance. Magic.. eso-
terism.. 'incomprehensible- - ' poetry..: the process of merging, showing us the holes to be mended, the atavistic
archaisms to be found there, unlike a false infinity of just going on and on. Human history itself comes to seem as
some sort of reading). And then there are life worlds that sustained the 'text' has gone, disappeared or drifted out
of ---- With the so-called linguistic turn in philosophy, it ahs been contended that everything has become a text
now. If everything has become a text --two differnt processes) then the presumption is that the life worlds that sus-
tained the 'text' has gone, disappeared or drifted out of alignment with our present view of reality. Can there be an
intentional unreadability rather than correct it must inevitably move in two only seemingly opposed directions:
power [the monstrous power of nihilism proferred by Nietzsche] or the mad. The most famous example being
Schreber's. Strictly speaking it is the _text_." "The text is a consequence of Leibnizian initial conditions: two balls
released simultaneously, rolling downhill, slashing water on each other as they go---are they communicating about
getting to the outer boundaries of the normal; no reader can be framed, everything can be at least placed in a field
of effects where the unreadable meets no better fate in these terms since it too must round into the available-to-
be-r- - ead. The proper name denotes an irreplacable necessity, irreplaceable but nevertheless opaque, clueless,
having to succumb to a structure which is not yet written." Maurice Blanchot 22. there is no way to get the data
back will be to pay a ransom," says Stuart Schechter, a doctoral candidate in computer security at Harvard. two
hypotheses: Perhaps everything truly is a non-communicative- - syncronistic simultanaeity, an opaque point de
capiton in Lacanian parlance, the convergence of materiality and pattern, a knot or confluence of energies gath-
ered by the inhuman of language 'itself' as it approaches an object-state, moving more toward the ding an sich in
its reference points, to the outer boundaries of the subject and society. Then - and only if it were not, in principal,
readable. What 'unreadable' would mean could only make sense in another system --psychoanalysis.- - Mystical
19
MONUMENTALITY, DISASTER AND THE UNREADABLE
"What is a book that no one reads? Something that is not yet written."
Maurice Blanchot

There is no way to interrogate the unreadable (although unread-ability hints at

deferred possibilities).
It doesn't even present a smooth and slippery surface. ("Reading makes of the book
what the sea and the wind make of objects fashioned by men: a smoother stone, a
fragment fallen from the sky without a past, without a future, the sight of which
silences questions." Blanchot Communication and the Work. Blanchot's comment
would seem to indicate that the readable/unreadable share a chiasmatic relationship:
that which is the MOST readable will become effaced, worn down by repeated read-
ings into an 'object' which can only convey it's surface, becoming a pebble on the
beach waiting to be found by those who will convert it into an artifact which can be at
least seen again, and to have it's unreadabliity restored. The fault line or liminal zone
between the two is the [para]site of the disaster.) It is the zone of merger, the stroke
between the monumental and the catastrophic.
The unreadable's jagged irregularities act as catches to be pulled along by the
thorns of history, a string theory of the unreadable, but only in the mode of the simul-
taneity of the unseen and the unheard. One can only 'be with' the unreadable, in a
position of the 'para-', the encrypted secret word of the para-nous, the parasite, the
beyond of the normal; no reader can be inside it or intermixed with it.
The void which Blanchot reserves for the heart of the sculptural --"an inaccessible
space both evident and withdrawn, perhaps immutable, perhaps ever restless, the con-
tained violence in the face of which we always feel in excess" -- becomes more and
more evident with the unreadable as it approaches an object-state, sa thing, moving
more toward the ding an sich in its decisive separation from the subject-world.
Unreadability is everything we wish it to be and then of a sudden, nothing at all
that we know, expect, or share likeness with.
Unreadability shares with the catastrophe and the disaster a density of meaning
becoming suddenly an evaporation of meaning.
texts share some of the disaster.) The unreadable's jagged irregularities act as catches to be read forward, into
the future? Perhaps everything truly is a structuring _practice_, a passage to the future and staring at the growing
pile of debris called 'history.' 2. Perhaps everything truly is a place for an endorsement of unreadability, even along
materialist lines, such as Fredric Jameson's comment on modern attempts at Utopias at bearing something like a
wormhole within the empty everyday. (" Fredric Jameson, THE POLITICS OF UTOPIA, New Left Review #25, p.
110) The uncanny always presupposes a misreading, a meconnaisance, the pivotal modernist incarnation of that
being Freud's misreading of himself in a hallway mirror, coming out of ---- With the so-called linguistic turn in phi-
losophy, it ahs been contended that everything has become a text --two differnt processes) then the presumption
is that the efficacy of telepathy is much greater in language than in some etheric substance). The everyday con-
cept of readability or communication is some 'freedom' there, some slippery surfaces where grappling hooks of
control find no purchase. But perhaps a fiction we tell ourselves to give a small escape clause, a non-transparent
loophole, an opaque harmonic. ----

20
 To monumentalize is to attempt to encrypt the very notion of readability into the
farthest future consciousness. It is to raise up to cosmic, mythic levels a perfectly bla-
tant, and in that sense banal, recounting of struggle. But the structures of really deep
time only will capture the notion of struggle and not the particularities that surround it,
just as an artifact can denote: "this was once 'read'" but not the exact message that it
contains. Its very unreadability says that (not it's impenetrability but its unreadable-
ness; to be unreadable is already to be partly penetrated.)
The monumental already participates in the disaster, or rather, it IS the disaster, the
catastrophic, but viewed from 'above' historically speaking, after the debris has settled
(Benjamin's backward viewing angel of history). There, the pieces of history, it's mute
unreadability is forced into focus and comprehension, bound to a frame which makes
it readable. The point of art and critique would be to liberate the unreadable INTO its
state of singular impenetrability and not to make it into a bound text.or rather to
make it a 'text' bound for some place other than text.

20