For those of us initially frustrated by Derrida's refusal, in Specters of Marx, to engage seriously with Marx and/or with politics, this book will not alleviate the problem. In fact, it exacerbates the frustration, but it does so in a way that may help to clarify the debate around the book. A decent selection of views and reviews on Specters of Marx (but missing the crucial review by Gayatri Spivak) is followed by Derrida's astonishingly petulant reply. Choosing sides becomes easier, even for the avowed deconstructionist, when Derrida's own pettiness makes it clear that (just as with Marxism) it is clearly possible to partake of a "Derrideanism without Derrida," and in so doing subtract the insularity of the man from the suggestiveness of the work. We readers will have to carry deconstructive Marxism farther than Derrida. But this supplement is always the condition of reading.

It is quite fundamental for the reader to understand that the main focus of Specters of Marx is spectrality and its attendant ideological implications, rather than Marx. One cannot read Derrida politically without misrepresenting his ideas. It is quite ironic that a number of Derrida's critics, particularly coming from the Marxist field, fall back on the dilapidated model of dialectics, and hence binary oppositions. Marx's ontology is forever tainted by the hauntological presence of the other. Derrida suggests that we examine the processes rather than the end products. This collection of essays, ranging from ridiculous to the sublime, is a response to the ideas set forward in Specters. It is very useful in approaching the text from a number of different angles.

Fred Engels said once that each generation of philosophers try arduously to soar higher in the sky than the previous, and here although one can see the value in the Left engaging with such a formidable thinker as Derrida, I would think the Left had better things to do,like the set of probelmatics concerning the globalization/exploitation of international labour,the eroding of the democratic state,the banality of neo-liberalism and its future. Perhaps the ultimate question here is what value emits itself after we read the various brilliant but ultimately marginal excursions/commentary into Derrida's work "Spectres of Marx". Derrida never claimed to be a Marxist and it is self-evident that he is merely attempting to arrest Marxism as countless others have, expunging it away,diluting its content from the level of intellectual discourse it rightly deserves. Derrida's body of work takened wholly refuses the content of such an arduous task ,being continually directly referred backwards to Heidegger and an affinity of the durational frame of the past reprisals into "what was" rather than what can be. Jameson's piece from a few years ago is the most comprehensive here, for he is always an excellent assembler of varigated,yet focused tracking like with a conceptual microscope the intellectual history of Derrida's thought. But Derrida's response to Jameson's response where Jameson's had erroneous placed the aesthetic in the field of play is a good example of indulgent useless bickering. Of course Derrida denies that the aesthetic is an integral component of his thought although he depends upon it continuously for his performative acts at creating new jargons,the conceptual 'writing' freedoms and cross genres (is this literature,a lecture- sketch, or philosophy, or art??) and incessant cross and inter-breeding of thoughts,fragments of excerpts, half-references to the Western panoply of thought from Freud,Heidegger etc. I think that is the ultimate problem with Derrida,he cannot convincingly deny any perspective,(although he has say obviously the opposite in interviews) in that his work seems to ascribe to conceptual indulgences and playfullness. Eagleton is also brilliant here and takes the more New Left perspective,which is old now, which still has vibrant points which again ultimately ponders the relationship of Marxism to various other ideological departures as deconstruction,Messianism and post-structuralism.I think ultimately we are barking up the wrong tree here for ultimately the lens which Derrida looks through(his body of thought) is so far removed from the problematics which Marxism(defined here in it's widest liberal sense) has developed throughout its long and tortured history,that again there are indeed larger dimensions to pursue.

I'll admit right now that this is the first (and probably last) of Derrida's books that I've read cover to cover. Therefore I'm sure all those converted post-modernists will lambast me for not fully grasping the meaning of this book since I can't put it in the context of Derrida's other works.

Nonetheless there is some interesting stuff here for the newcomer, especially anyone interested in what it means to have a language as 'one's own' or to have a 'mother tongue.' Derrida asks these questions in reference to his experiences as a French-speaking Algerian Jew and as a participant at a conference in French-speaking Louisiana (where this work was first presented). The whole book is about Derrida's problems with identity and language, and he is mildly interesting in drawing out some paradoxes like 'we only ever speak one language' and 'we never speak only one language.' He documents his personal problems with language, claiming that 'I feel lost outside the French language.'

Yet Derrida writes in a very annoying style, creating new words every other page and presenting the book as if it were the transciption of a dialogue. It's also overpriced unless you're a Derrida fanatic, which means you probably already own it anyway.

Not exactly a must read.

after wading through _writing and difference_, this nice little book was a most pleasant surprise. In comparison to W & D, _The Monolingualism of the Other_ is a very readable book and there are plenty of ideas presented in this text that can be grasped without fully understanding Derrida's project. In conjunction with this, many of the ideas that Derrida discusses can be accepted and implented into ones own thought without necessarily agreeing with Derrida's project. An enjoyable and thought-provoking read.

"Monolingualism of the Other; or, The Prosthesis of Origin," by Jacques Derrida, is a compelling blend of autobiographical material and cultural criticism. Originally published in French in 1996, the text has been translated into English by Patrick Mensah. According to a note at the beginning of the book, a shorter, different version of the text was delivered orally at a colloquium at the Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, in 1992.

In the book, Derrida reflects on his past as an Algerian Jew living under French colonialism. He raises questions about language politics, personal identity, cultural domination, the notion of a "mother tongue," and the idea of "metalanguage." He reflects on the practical mechanics of French colonial administration in Algeria, and on Algeria's Jewish population: "a disintegrated 'community,' cut up and cut off." He also discusses his own problematic relationship with the French language.

I found "Monolingualism of the Other" absolutely gripping. Although Derrida's prose (as translated by Mensah) sometimes strikes me as convoluted to the point of obscurity, I often found Derrida's style to be elegant, even poetic, and very accessible. But be warned: if you're intimidated by phrases like "ontico-ontological re-mark," "a pre-egological ipseity," or "the hegemony of the homogeneous," the book may be a bit much to take.

But many will, I believe, tear into this challenging text with gusto. I believe that the issues raised by Derrida in this book are relevant to many other cultural phenomena: the debate over Black English, the political and literary recognition of creole and pidgin languages, the ongoing efforts to preserve the Celtic languages, etc. If you have a serious interest in these and related issues, I strongly recommend this book.

My approach to the fame which Derrida enjoys is his daring in playing with the danger of disrupting what people think that they know. In his discussion of the final topic in this book, a note which Nietzsche wrote that said, "I have forgotten my umbrella," he openly expresses his philosophical doubt about its significance with what must be considered his standard stance, "The meaning and the signature that appropriates it remain in principle inaccessible." (p. 125) Offering an interpretation is like guessing what Nietzsche's umbrella might have been metaphorically, as one might consider the significance of religion, social thought, conscience, or morality as it relates to a person's place in the world. The interest in Derrida's examination of Nietzsche's style, "Hence the heterogeneity of the text," (p. 95) seems to be greatest in the consideration of alternative positions which Nietzsche offers regarding women, truth, etc. "It is not that it is necessary to choose sides with the heterogeneous or the parody (which would only reduce them once again). Nor, given that the master sense, the sole inviolate sense, is irretrievable, does it necessarily follow that Nietzsche's mastery is infinite, his power impregnable, or his manipulation of the snare impeccable." (p. 99) This stuff is only obvious to those whose ludicrous embrace of comic material does not exceed their grasp of what a comic society consists of, the fools that mortals be. Don't get back to me on this: ask anybody.

In having forgotten what I've read and read what I've forgotten, I am pleasantly bemused. Where to begin where this is no beginning but <> and no end but <> (and as I write these words of Derrida the endless possibilties of ideas spur forth, from nothing, from being, from woman essence, the essence of woman - and in these phrases the kernel of a metaphysical enquiry). Perhaps at a distance from the text, can any thoughts be produced. this was some of the most pleasant reading I've done in a while. I don't know how much I <> and <>, but it was fun. I think, though, reading Derrida is like reading poetry. So much is packed into a dense space and such play of words, philosophies and language are at work that at point I can only enjoy the literary quality of his writing.

What is 'Truth' anyhow? In Spurs, this question is rigorously explored using Nietzsche's aphoristic writing style as an example of honesty in literature/philosophy. The reader weaves through the maze that is Spurs, searching for answers ('Truth') but only finding style and utterly visual metaphors created by Nietzsche and polished by Derrida. Is 'Truth' a "veiled woman" or is it "Nietzsche's umbrella"? Bring your interpretive seeds and sow them in the weave of Spurs--perhaps you'll find an answer that will suit your, well....ahh....nevermind...

This book of selected texts, arranged chronologically, includes poetry, fiction, essays and theatre pieces. Dense and not easily digested, it is filling fare, full of intricately wrought words and images. Most of the work is translated from original French texts. For me, the most beautiful, clear writing is in sections with Cixous' own revision of the English translation. If you love writing, internal exploration or feminist thought, please read "To Live The Orange", first published in 1979. Her words gave me tears, goosebumps, and a deep experience on many levels.

This reader is a diverse selection of Cixous' work. Beautifully translated, thoughtfully arranged and annotated. The foreword by Derrida is very helpful in understanding the translation and its difficulties.

The text maintains Cixous' poetic exploration of prose. From 'Angst' to 'Deluge' to the 'Three Steps on the Ladder of Writing', one feels they have entered this writer's mind and soul. Cixous's work is deeply psychological and her use of the power of words transcend language, at least in this translation for the most part. The french language is not something that can be transparently 'imported' as certain things are so inherent to the language itself, they cannot be understood by the monoligual psyche.

But even for those who never wish to delve into the french language in its original form, this book will do a fine job of throwing them into a pool of thought and mixed feelings.

Anyone interested in the philosophy of language will find Derrida's deconstructionist take on J.L. Austin's "How to Do Things With Words" quite interesting, and, at times, enlightening. But the real fun in this book is when Derrida begins to attack John Searle's response to Derrida's take on Austin. He takes off his gloves and really goes after him and if anything, you'll be left questioning your assumptions about the maturity levels of renowned academics.

"Limited Inc." is made up of three sections: "Speech Event Context" as the core (or intro?), "A,B,C..." as a responce to Searl's rediculousness/seriousness, and a last section of which i cannot remember the name but worth the read. "Limited Inc." is worth is weight in gold alone in Speech Event Context, as it is Derrida at his most clear and concise, a refreshing change. It discusses the concept of iritability and in many ways sums up much of Derrida's work in writing. "A,B,C.." however go to clear up Speech Event Context and take us on a wild ride through Searl's (lack of seriousness/too much seriousness) and go to greath lengths in interesting details. It may be the most amusing/humerous work by derrida simply through his conversations with Searl. Well worth the read.

"Let's be serious" Derrida writes. Then four paragraphs later he writes it again. Then several pages later again. What is the effect of this textual trope? It gives the reader the feeling that what Derrida has been writing, reasoning and arguing up to that point has not been "serious". And that means, it can't be philosophy, for philosophy concerns "serious" issues right? But all the while, Derrida continues to address important questions and "serious" arguments put forth by "serious" philosopher John Searle's... so surely he is in fact being serious? Can we be really be certain? Derrida, I think, wants to open up these questions and it is here where his style itself becomes the philosophical question: can we ever really be sure of conceptual serious and non-serious speech acts?

Limited Inc is a collection of three short pieces which encapsulate the famous exchange (or polemic?) b/w the late Austin, Derrida and american philosopher Searle. The first essay is Derrida's critique of Austin's earliest statement of Speech Act theory: "How to do things with Words". The second is Derrida lengthy reply to Searle's criticisms of Derrida's first essay (Searle is the crusader of contemporary Speech Acts.. Mr. Speech Acts, if you will) and the third, and perhaps most insightful is "Afterword" an interview with Derrida several years after the fact, where Derrida reflects on the "violence" of the earlier Searle-Derrida exchange.

I give Limited Inc a 5 star rating for simply the addition of "Afterwords". This interview is the (in my experience) clearest statement of Derrida's project of deconstruction-- to lessen the "violence" of philosophical practices and bring them to a new contextual level where they no longer operate undetected. It is also Derrida's first direct response to many of the (I believe) misdirected attacks on deconstruction -- e.g., the much misunderstood phrase "il n'y a pas d'ors text" -- there is nothing outside the text, which Derrida states vehemently, means not that there is no "reality" outside of a text (idealism) but, there is nothing outside of "context".

It is points like this, I believe, which will help clear up a lot of the speculation surrounding Derrida's philosophy *and* politics. Limited Inc, I predict, will be an integral text in bringing Derrida's unique philosophical enterprise its into the Post-Wittgensteinian analytic tradition where it deserves to be studied.

Begin with essay #10. It's short, it's famous (it launched deconstruction in America), and it's fairly lucid. Then turn to essay #1 for another stunning discussion of the limits of structuralism.

Essay #5 is devoted to structuralism's rival, phenomenology. Just as essay #10 suggested that structuralism can't conceive of a structure with a fluid center, and essay #1 suggested that structuralism tends to impoverish literary texts because it can't account for certain textual energies, this essay insists that Husserl's phenomenology cannot do justice to origins, cannot think genesis. Unhappily, this is a dense and difficult piece of writing.

Next take up essay #9. Derrida is interested here with Hegel's attempt to repress the free play of signification via conceiving philosophy as a totality. Derrida also discusses Bataille's attempt to think the unthought of the Hegelian system, to ascertain what, if anything, can elude such philosophical closure. This is a great essay, but familiarity with Hegel's Master/Slave dialectic is a prerequisite.

If you have read Foucault's MADNESS AND CIVILIZATION, you'll want to read essay #2. Here Derrida attempts to call into question that book's major thesis by arguing that Foucault misreads Descartes. This essay is nicely structured but, for this reviewer at least, not terribly convincing. I also feel that essay #7, on Freud, is not a success. It is so difficult, so tedious, that most readers will cease to care about Derrida's point long before he gets around to making it.

Happily, there are two essays (#6 and #8) dealing with the writings of that fascinating artist/lunatic Antonin Artaud. They are both pretty dazzling, but I suggest taking on #8 first. There are also two rather short, amusing pieces on the Jewish thinker Edmond Jabes (essays #3 and #11). He appears to be something of a kindred spirit to Derrida.

Finish up with essay #4, the longest and most ambitious in this collection. Echoing themes from essay #9, here Derrida takes on the early writings of Emmanuel Levinas and his claim to have stepped outside of metaphysics. It's a demanding, but fascinating piece of writing.

One thing that I'm tired of reading in these reviews is how difficult it is to read 20th-century French philosophers, how they're all a bunch of obscurantists with no substance, etc., etc. I like clear prose as much as the next guy, but to dispose of an entire (very important) movement of thought because the writing isn't aesthetically pleasing is anti-intellectual snobbery.

Now I'd like to offer some tips on reading Derrida for understanding:
1. He often summarizes the conventional wisdom about whatever text he's responding to. If you learn to recognize when he is doing this, you will save yourself a lot of trouble. In those passages, he is usually more clear in his writing, just the standard academic tone. From what I've seen, he goes out of his way to be fair to the standard reading, so you can trust that he's not simply stacking the deck.
2. Don't worry too much about memorizing every pun he makes. I think the translator probably gets overzealous about the puns sometimes.
3. Read the footnotes: I find they're easier going than the main text a lot of the time.
4. Remember: he's just saying the same damn thing over and over, using different texts in the process.

In conclusion, I actually recommend reading _Of Grammatology_ before or instead of this book. The bulk of it is a long, sustained argument on Rousseau, an author who is probably more familiar to most people than Artaud, Hegel, or Levinas.

In the beginning of Jacques Lacan's work "the ethics of psychoanalysis", Lacan speaks of honey that has no natural divisions and is instantly all over the place. Enter Derrida. This was only the second work I had read by Derrida at the time a few years ago and it astounded me. The breadth of commentary, play, and insight in these essays is radical - moving from freud, to foucault, to levi-strauss, to Artaud, to an amasing and important work on Levinas, to writings of his own, and more. This work (is it one or many?) is perhaps Derrida at his most poetical and yet at his most clear. In other works, his knack of writing seeming hieroglyphics makes his ideas extremely difficult to decipher. In this work, however, his play actually opens itself up to what he's doing. Not only that but where his poetics become more analytic, his language is fairly clear and understandable, given a background on the subject (freud, levinas, etc.). In multiple readings through the years this work has proved more and more fruitful and is still one of my favorite works by him (besides possibly the clear and consice Speech Event Context in "Limited Inc.", "Spurs", and "Gift of Death"). This is Derrida's insights all over the place - thank God.

This is a very saddening book in which these authors, who have helped to move our thinking away from some of the remnants of religion over which we continue to trip, express their (perhaps elderly, not to say senile) longing for old-time religion itself. Not only that, but they suggest, as opponents of postmodernism or pragmatism do, that outgrowing the tiresome remnants of religion found in the arrogant self-descriptions of scientists or ethicists actually allows (or is it causes?) "the return of religion" - an event which they claim to be witnessing although they offer little argument for its existence or desirability. They seem (and, of course, each takes a slightly different tack) to be arguing ad populum instead of admitting their desire for religion. They explain that people are scared by nuclear proliferation and environmental destruction and are turning to religion, but do not address whether such false comfort should be joined in. Rather, they simply join in it - without, however, ever quite saying so. Not one of them writes "I believe in God," but each asserts by every word he writes "God is worth writing about."

Jacques Derrida's contribution to this seminar which was held in 1994 on the island of Capri is the essay entitled "Faith and Knowledge." What is particularly interesting about this keynote address is Derrida's neologism "globalatinization" which he defines as "this strange alliance of Christianity, as the experience of the death of God, and tele-technoscientific capitalism." There is talk of religion and digitality, airborn pilgrimages to Mecca, Jerusalem and its three monotheisms watched over by the heavenly and monstrous glance of CNN, a Pope versed in televisual rhetoric, miracles transmitted live followed by commercials, and lastly the televisual diplomacy of the Dalai Lama. Because Capri is an island not far from Rome, Derrida also has some interesting things to say about religion in the Mediterranean and the Levant, as well as the Promised Land and the desert. This essay is particularly opaque and beautiful and it would definitely help the reader if he or she is familiar with Martin Heidegger's Sein und Zeit (Being And Time) as well as Beitrage zur Philosophie (Contributions to Philosophy), as JD name drops the great German philosopher's ideas here and there throughout this essay. This is definitely good beach reading.

Derrida and Vattimo's collection of essays given on the Isle of Capri truly shows how even postmodern philosophy must still come front-and-center with the question of religion. As postmodernity brings an end to the metaphysics that made God undesirable, a different type of God, a God of Life (as Unamuno would call it) must be dealt with anew. Derrida, Vattimo, Gadamar, Vitiello, Trias and others discuss the role of religion in an age that claims to be so removed from it.

My personal impression of the book is that Derrida reveals the type of religious issues that he offered us in his _Circumfessions_ and is wonderfully explicated in John Caputo's _Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida_. Vitiello's essay "Toward a Topology of the Religious" is insightful and necessary (if only Nietzsche could have read it!).

...repeat yourself 10 times! This seems to be the approach that Caputo takes in this book. This should come as a great surprise, of course, to readers of Derrida, who likely see no end to the amount you could write about this prolific and deeply influential contemporary philosopher. In support of Caputo, his writing comes with great clarity and does help the reader wade through the beginnings of the depths of Derrida; however, he neglects to address much of the scope of Derrida's work, and instead rewrites the first 30 pages 5 or 6 times. The interview, of course, helps bring clarity to Derrida's philosophical project, but for anyone who would be reading Derrida, the interview is straight-forward enough that the remainder of the book is excessive and unnecessary. Furthermore, Caputo uses this space to express not-so-subtle (and irrelevant to the text) personal grievances. Caputo writes of the "narrow and culturally irrelevant style of philosophizing in... the Ivy League departments of philosophy, resistant to its own history, to history itself, and to the socio-political matrix of philosophizing in every age." (p.39) As for his authority on this subject, Caputo has never studied nor taught at any of these departments (earning his B.A. from LaSalle University, M.A. from Villanova University, and Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr College) Remarks such as these have no place in literary criticism, and Caputo does well in demonstrating his lack of professional integrity here and elsewhere in the book. If you want an easy to read introduction to Derrida, try "Positions", a collection of three interviews translated by Alan Bass. Else, just take on "Of Grammatology".

Much of this book is seems to alternate between giddy celebration of Derrida and a prickly defense of Deconstruction. The latter is probably unneeded in this book, the former makes me impatient. Caputo's "playful" style becomes quite annoying - unfortunate because the material is very interesting (I particularly liked the chapter on Community).

The first part of the book, the interview, is quite good. The questions are engaging and Derrida's responses are clear and relevant. The rest of the book is more spotty. On the whole, the book is worthwhile but it might be more profitable to go straight to Derrida's writing.

I would suggest that anyone (a "beginner") purchasing this book to understand "Deconstruction" as a philosophy in the grand meta-narrative sense will be disappointed. "Deconstruction" should be understood more precisely as a process of keeping a critical check on philosophical assumptions employed in philosophy in any historical time. It involves --as a process-- analysis of (un)warranted assumptions and conclusions in philosophy, and in that regard is extraordinarily helpful in assessing --to a certain extent-- philosophical arguments. One should be quick to add that "Deconstruction" is a tool, not a dogma or philosophical worldview per se, which the book attempts to address implicitly. I would take care not to recommend this and related works to those interested in analysis of pure philosophy, which does have value unto itself outside of socio-historical and linguistic criticism, which --to a large extent-- is the main thrust of "Deconstruction" as a "discipline." Overall, the book constitutes a good introduction to Derrida's thinking --thinking which has without doubt provided much of the furniture of the landscape of "Deconstructive" analysis. This book is a nice introduction to that landscape, not philosophical landscapes as conceived by philosophers. Though Derrida is an extraordinary philosopher, "Deconstruction" should probably not be thought of as a philosophical process. I am not sure if this book communicates this implicit distinction that is currently drawn among many respectable academicians.

It's unfortunate that Derrida has carried on the Western philosophical tradition of unnecessarily turgid, convoluted, and just plain bad writing inaugurated by the inflated Hegel and exemplified by Sartre and a host of other heady hacks. On the plus side, this is a solid collection of Derrida's most important pieces and enumerates some of his best ideas: difference, logocentrism, the trace, etc. Not for beginners, but if you're determined to read an important thinker, this may be required reading...some of it anyhow.

Peggy Kamuf offers a well organized anthology of Derrida's varied contributions.

by far this is the most accessible introduction tothe forbidden threshold of Derrida's thought. Peggy Kamuf mounts the fairly limitless edifice of his work through seasoned selected excerpts,If you are fascinated forever by the conceptual,the literary,or analytic,the performative or philosphic focus,Derrida's work is like an alive moment that touches each in between elements of text,of ideas.All sometimes in simultanaeity or in context to each.If you come to Derrida it must from some place(time,geographic/cultural)some discipline,and sadly enough that acts to skew and blind,to opaque-ify Derrida's virtuoso,contextual,cross-referencing,overdetermined,overanalyzed modes of thought. But if you have scoured literature(Blanchot,Ponge,Jabes) not for its own sake,or thought,looked at ideas(Plato) (Heidegger) retrogressively yet with a committment to subversion(Genet) (Marx) of the Western canon,Derrida work serves these realms quite admirably.I humbly request you gander and pass time at this collection, peak between the blinds(Kamuf's metaphor)before you proceed directly to an original work. Derrida's work has that element of throwing forward a growth of petrified thought finding new conceptual life in the present, or not so distant past. So wherever you begin in Derrida it is like a timeless warp to be repeated some place,some time to come or had come,or had been,or will not ever be.

One could open up this review by pointing out that the book being reviewed is not a "coherent" work in the conventional sense of the term but this would be playing into the hands of the deconstructionist. Perhaps it is best to phrase one's comments in such a fashion as to avoid the need for anything more-than-average coherence in a review. "The Margins of Philosophy" is an interesting work by this academically controversial author. Generally speaking--and what more can one do in a review--Derrida's readings are heavily influenced by Heidegger's statement that what an author keeps silent is as important as what he states. This is asserted almost immediately in the introduction as Derrida lets us know that what philosophy (and philosophers) have pushed to the margin in their work is very important to explore since its unveiling will de-center the work. Put differently, every writing undercuts itself in the end. In a series of separate, but linked essays, Derrida goes on to demonstrate how this sort of thing happens in Hegel, Saussure, Benveniste, Heidegger, and others.

I am not the first to point out that Derrida is a perceptive, subtle reader with a very keen eye for the hidden details. "White Mythology" is an interesting discussion of the role of metaphor in philosophy and its consequences for philosophy. I am also not the first to complain that Derrida's taste for exegesis runs towards the extravagant and excessive. The aforementioned essay spans 65 pages for reasons that otherwise escape me. There is also the more serious problem in Derrida that his keen eye is not keen enough and he is too clever by half in his explication. At one point in the work he connects the greek word for intuiting (ie. seeing with the soul) "theorein" with the desire for death. Strictly speaking this is a conflation of the desire to be a god with the desire to be unconscious (a leftover from the decay of romanticism?). An elementary reading of Plato's Phaedrus makes this clear. His obsession with the "metaphysics of presence" is also a problem for the work, as he hitches his interpretations to this dubious construction and the interpretations ultimately suffer for it. This is not to say that there isn't much of philosophical interest in the work for Derrida gives the reader much to chew on. He reminds us that any serious reading of a text must devote itself scrupulously to the whole of the text and not just to those parts which we think are interesting. Though, perhaps, not the best place to start one's study of Derrida it is certainly worth a serious read if only to understand what some of the shouting is all about.

Derrida, Foucalt and Lyotard have come to be some of the best-known examples of post-modern thought. Of the three, I find Derrida to have the most "logical depth" to borrow a term from information theory; that could be due to some of his ideas in conjunction with the way in which he presents them.

In Margins the reader is treated immediately to an intersting idea of Derrida's - that the most important part of philosophy occurs in the "margins" of work. That is, it is the contextualization of ideas that is fundamentally important, not necessarily what is in them. This echoes what Bateson wrote quite a while ago in "Steps to an Ecology of the Mind", a much more accessible work; Lyotard also develops the idea of contextualization within "Postmodern Fables" through much more literary methods. Derrida's development of the differance and his views on Hegel are visionary and I enjoyed reading those sections in Margins; the rest I very difficult to digest even after several readings.

Derrida's ideas of context within infinite regress of contexts put him in an interesting philosophical position since the paradox cannot be resolved. That is, by demonstrating the subjectivity of any literary (and what is the limit of the term literary - isn't everything literary?) work he basically undermines most of Western philosophy. Hegel was close but not quite willing to go far enough as Derrida demonstrates.

In my opinion the more casual reader will be better off with the readily-available "Derrida for Beginners" type of books rather than trying to tackle this one. If this is part of a course then I suggest reading it while armed with some other overviews for reference.

Begin with "Tympan", it's designed to serve as an introduction to the ten essays which follow and, despite a lot of word play, Derrida does mention most of the themes informing this collection (philosophy's attempt to master its domain, Hegel as the philosopher of limits, the threat metaphor poses to philosophical discourse, etc).
Read "Differance" next (it's probably the single most famous thing Derrida has ever written). After declaring the thought of difference to be crucial to our intellectual epoch (he mentions Saussure, Nietzsche, and Freud before taking up Heidegger's notion of ontological difference) Derrida proposes the nonword/nonconcept of "differance" to go them all one better. This is a dazzling essay, but if it leaves you more exhausted than exhilarated, then Derrida just isn't for you.
Essay #2 is a dense and convoluted discussion of the metaphysics of presence in Aristotle and Hegel. Skip this.
Essay #3 is a surprisingly interesting investigation of Hegel's semiology (of all things). Derrida demonstrates that Hegel's disdain for non-phonetic scripts (say, hieroglyphics) is not just a quirk, but is crucial to Hegel's entire philosophical project.
"The Ends Of Man" is a classic example of 1960's French anti-humanism. It's essentially an attempt to rescue Hegel, Husserl, and Heidegger from their existentialist interpreters. Another very famous piece (and rightfully so).
Essay #5 is a sort of Cliffs Notes version of OF GRAMMATOLOGY; it deals with the denigration of writing in the thought of Saussure and Rousseau. Very readable.
Essay #6 is all about Husserl's theory of signs and I found it incomprehensible.
Essay #7 concerns itself with to what extent the grammar and syntax of a particular language influences what can be thought in that language. Recommended, despite the opacity of Derrida's criticisms of Benveniste.
"White Mythology" is the longest and most demanding essay in this collection, so leave it for last. I'm not even going to venture a comment on this one.
Essay #9 meanders quite a while before it gets around to illustrating Valery's low opinion of philosophy, so be patient.
The book wraps up with Derrida's notorious reading/misreading of that wonderful little book, HOW TO DO THINGS WITH WORDS. This modest essay launched a feud between Derrida and the American philosopher John Searle. Much ado about nothing, I say.