The desire for Neutral and the Singular. Notes on the aporias of an ethical curiosity in Barthes’ works.

Abstract

Through the desire for Neutral, discussed in his course at the Collège de France on the Neutral (1977-1978), Barthes positions himself as fervently “disinterested” in institutional knowledge. In particular, the intellectual journey of Barthes, from the politically engaged author of the reviews of the 1950s to the amateur, searching for a hermeneutics of the self, culminates in his course at the Collège de France: the passage from literary critic to praeceptor amoris is revealed by the ethical desire for the Singular. In Barthes’ “concern for the self”, in which emancipation of the individual would precede that of the collective, the conception of an ethics is recognizable, without being placed in an immediately political doctrine. In this way, practice of the self coincides with a type of writing, in which literature is valued for its effect, its use, than for its sense. The appreciation of a text as a propaedeutic to the self would constitute in fact a political usage of literature: a search for sense of self would not be purely individual and consolatory, but rather incite an active practice of bliss. This article discusses primarily the relationship between Barthien desire for idiosyncrasy and the ethics of the Singular.