Before the Verb: On Blanchot's Use of Se

Abstract:This paper examines the uses and possible significance of the third-person reflexive se. The occurrence of this form allows us to analyze philosophical concerns in Blanchot's narrative and critical writings: the relation of activity to passivity, the representation of liminal states of consciousness, and the ability of writing to capture the event of dying and death. The article concludes by turning to Blanchot's last text published as a récit, Le Dernier Homme. By tracking se, it shows how this minor syntactic structure conceals a nexus of questions concerning the ability of language to convey the limits of thinking.