Utopia and Political Theology

Bowie consists of twenty-one short chapters that function as a collection of conceptual fragments. Bowie's artistic work already provides a series of different periods each with its own stock of identities which could easily be comprised into different sections of this book according to, as Critchley calls them, illusions he inhabited, both musically and aesthetically. Although a sense of linearity is present, as the author tends to give an overview of albums and his own fan sensibilities, dividing the book according to Bowie's own artistic eras is avoided. The division into twenty-one chapters is much closer to breaking Bowie's work into conceptual categories that are present throughout his career and are related to questions of identity, sexuality and desire or sometimes even Bowie's own life in the background of it all. Still, as the author notes at the very beginning of the book – it is important not to conflate Bowie as a persona of popular music with his work. It is a popular app...

9. rujna 2011.Draga Sarah,ispričavam se što je ovo pismo tako formalno, ali nemam sama u sebe povjerenja da bih ovo mogla izgovoriti uz čašu vina, posebno dok još i nisam sigurna što želim reći.Vjeruj mi da sam oduvijek cijenila tvoje prijateljstvo. Na onom pješačkom izletu kroz pustinju Sinaj, kada smo se svi upoznali, nijedno od nas četvero nije bilo sklono prigovaranju i to je ono što nas je zbližilo. Ostali su turisti neprestano cmizdrili zbog vrućine i hrane, ali mi smo bili neustrašivi. Kad ti je od previše sunca izbio gnojni herpes, unatoč povrijeđenoj taštini nastavila si stupati dalje kao da to nije ništa. Stoga bi mi bilo grozno da ispadne da je ovo pismo prigovor – no ipak, možda ono i jest prigovor.Tvoj je muž umro usred terorističkog napada 11. rujna. Moj je muž umro uslijed terorističkog napada 11. rujna. Toliko je toga proizišlo iz tih prijedloga, male slovne varijacije.Začudo, tvoja mi je priča jednako živa kao moja jer sam mnogo puta čula kako je prepričavaš na zabavam...

This essay starts from the premise that André Breton’s First Manifesto of Surrealism constitutes the ‘event’ of that movement (i.e., ‘event’ as defined in Alain Badiou’s Ethics), an event subsequently betrayed by its subject, André Breton, in his encounter with Nadja. Situated between rupture and repetition, the opportunity of the event returns in the Second Manifesto of Surrealism. Taking as its target Breton’s novel Nadja, the essay addresses the issue of event as repetition and explores the ramifications of the ‘failure’ to ‘imagine’ one’s continued fidelity to the event. Consequently, this article reads Nadja as a ‘failure’: the failure posed by representation itself, but also the failure of representation to completely annihilate the promise of a “beyond” encrypted in the project of surrealist imagination. Thus, I would like to play off the idea of failure in two complementary ways. First, I look at the ‘failure’ that is more significant than any achievement. Second, I address the...

I don't have a clue why I even travelled to Armenia; even now, after all these years, the reasons that brought me to that part of the world remain unclear. When someone asked me what was so interesting about Armenia, I mumbled something about its history, about its people adopting Christianity before the Romans and about little churches from the fourth and fifth centuries. “And what's wrong with our little churches? Look into your own backyard first,” they advised, “then turn to wherever you like.” Still, during that winter and spring of 1998, I felt an ever-growing desire to travel to Armenia. Days were getting warmer and the Japanese cherries in front of my building revealed their long-expected blossoms. And that’s how April passed. My flight was on May 1. I gave seemingly simple instructions to my girlfriend: “If I do not get in touch within two weeks, report me missing at the Embassy in Athens.” And more importantly: “Please, buy the Sports News next Sunday and find out the score f...

In attempting to represent political transformations, we often encounter a moment that seems to resist narrativisation, a moment of obstinate inconsistency which various theoretical, historical and fictional accounts cannot properly absorb except by way of indicating the parameters of a rupture. Here, I present a position which views these unrepresentable moments as structurally necessary features of revolutionary events. It is not simply that, at such historical junctures, we are faced with an abundance of information and that the unrepresentability or narrative deficit is the consequence of this surplus; on the contrary, the founding act that accompanies any radical transformation necessarily involves a certain temporal contraction. To the extent that narrative relies on a linear chronology, it fails to capture this moment of contraction. Indeed, this is why works of political philosophy associated with a founding contract (for example Hobbes’s Leviathan and Rousseau’s Social Contrac...

In a period witnessing the increasing popularity of superhero franchises, comic book historian Tim Hanley sheds light on the forgotten history of the world’s most famous female superhero, Wonder Woman. Tim Hanley’s Wonder Woman Unbound: The Curious History of the World’s Most Famous Heroine, as its title suggests, aims to explore the curious path of Wonder Woman: from the creation of the character to her contemporary iconic status. The book is comprised of three sections that follow the eras of American comic books: Golden Age, Silver Age and Bronze Age. Hanley starts off with Wonder Woman’s origin story, associating it primarily with the life and work of her creator, psychologist William Marston. The story begins when an American pilot, Steve Trevor, crashes on the hidden Paradise Island and is found injured by Diana and her fellow Amazons. Paradise Island is the home of mythical Amazons guided by goddesses Aphrodite and Athena. Their world is an only-female utopia situated far away f...