Eros in Mourning
From Homer to Lacan
Published on 27. December 1994
Book
Hardback
248 pages
978-0-8018-4923-7 (ISBN)
Description
"For the religious-philosophical tradition in which Western literature is rooted," writes Henry Staten, "mourning is the horizon of all desire. As soon as desire is something felt by a mortal being for a mortal being, eros (as desire-in-general) will always be to some degree disturbed in its functioning by the anticipation of loss." This book begins with a reading of the "Iliad" which shows how Homer, not yet influenced by the ideology of transcendence, analyzes the structure of unassuageable mourning in a way that is as up-to-date as the latest poststructuralism. Then, in readings of the Gospel of John, Dante, the troubadours, Petrarch, "Hamlet", "Paradise Lost", "La Princess de Cleves", and "Heart of Darkness", Staten shows how literary history may be reconstituted in terms of a poetics of mourning that keeps in sight the traditional problematic of mortal and transcendent eros. Finally, a reading of Lacan suggests that this writer - so profoundly influential today on the question of desire - must be understood in the context of the dialectic of mourning that dominates his work.
Reviews / Votes
"At the end of Henry Staten's breathtaking 'Eros in Mourning' we are left to stare blindly into the awesome face of that which is said to transfix the canonical avatars of Western man from the grieving hero Akhilleus (Achilles) in Homer's 'Iliad' to the death- driven psychoanalyst in 'The Seminar of Jacques Lacan.'. . . For Staten the plight of Helen is the merest pretext for the imagined outrage done to the man's own sense of self. Staten traces the vicissitudes of the "thanatoerotophobic complex" across a splendid series of readings of our most canonical texts down to the present. Alas we continue to see the self same murder and rape not only in literature but in that other Troy that is Bosnia today. Stater's 'Eros in Mourning' helps us divine the undying dynamics of this lethal despair."--Steven Z. Levine, 'Bryn Mawr Classical Review' "'Eros in Mourning' is a brilliant, precisely, powerfully, and passionately argued analysis of the structure of mourning fundamental to Western transcendental thinking. Staten is a superb reader, engaging us in levels of his texts that make it clear why they earned canonical status."--Charles Altieri, University of California, BerkeleyMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Baltimore, MD
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Weight
510 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-8018-4923-7 (9780801849237)
DOI
10.56021/9780801849237
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
02/2002
Johns Hopkins University Press
€41.10
Article not available for order
Person
Henry Staten is professor of English and adjunct professor of philosophy at the University of Utah. He is the author of 'Wittgenstein and Derrida' and 'Nietzsche's Voice.'