Abstract

This extended essay is an inquiry into the nature and possibility of an ideal community. Readers of Blanchot know not to expect answers to the great questions that move his thought -- rather, they must live with the questions at the new level to which they have been raised by his discourse. Those discovering Blanchot's thought will be compelled by its uncompromising exploration and leaps of immediacy in a time like Blanchot's own, in which existing concepts of community may no longer be enough. Maurice Blanchot was an important influence on Derrida, an intimate friend of Georges Bataille, and a powerful force in modern literature. Other books include Thomas the Obscure, When the Time Comes and The Gaze of Orpheus, collected in Barrytown, Ltd.'s The Station Hill Blanchot Reader.