Mourir de penser

Dernier Royaume #9

by Pascal Quignard

Le neuvième tome de Dernier Royaume est consacré à la pensée. Ainsi Pascal Quignard arrive au cœur de sa quête. Livre après livre, Dernier Royaume cherche à éprouver une autre façon de penser. Un mode de penser qui n’a rien à voir avec la philosophie. Une façon de s’attacher à la lettre, à la fragmentation de la langue écrite, et d’avancer en décomposant les images des rêves, en désordonnant les formes verbales, en exhumant les textes sources. Ce livre explore trois choses. Comment la pensée et la mort se touchent. Comment la pensée est proche de la mélancolie. Comment la pensée s’abrite auprès du traumatisme. Celui qui pense « compense » un très vieil abandon. Ce qui fait le fond de la pensée c’est la mère manquante.
De même que le rêve est un sens dont les images désordonnées, condensées, paradoxales, intuitionnent quelque chose qui a précédé le sommeil et qui fait retour en elles, de même la pensée est un sens qui use de mots écrits, retranscrits, retraduits, épluchés, étymologisés, néologisés, lesquels projettent des liens entre des silhouettes éparses, où on s’est jadis perdu.

240 pages, Paperback

First published September 10, 2014

About the author

Romancier, poète et essayiste, Pascal Quignard est né en 1948. Après des études de philosophie, il entre aux Éditions Gallimard où il occupe les fonctions successives de lecteur, membre du comité de lecture et secrétaire général pour le développement éditorial. Il enseigne ensuite à l’Université de Vincennes et à l’École Pratique des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. Il a fondé le festival d’opéra et de théâtre baroque de Versailles, qu’il dirige de 1990 à 1994. Par la suite, il démissionne de toutes ses fonctions pour se consacrer à son travail d’écrivain. L’essentiel de son oeuvre est disponible aux Éditions Gallimard, en collection blanche et en Folio.

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Pascal Quignard is a French writer born in Verneuil-sur-Avre, Eure. In 2002 his novel Les Ombres errantes won the Prix Goncourt, France's top literary prize. Terrasse à Rome (Terrasse in Rome), received the French Academy prize in 2000, and Carus was awarded the "Prix des Critiques" in 1980.
One of Quignard's most famous works is the eighty-four "Little Treatises", first published in 1991 by Maeght. His most popular book is probably Tous les matins du monde (All the Mornings in the World), about 17th-century viola de gamba player Marin Marais and his teacher, Sainte-Colombe, which was adapted for the screen in 1991, by director Alain Corneau. Quignard wrote the screenplay of the film, in collaboration with Corneau. Tous les matins du monde, starring Jean-Pierre Marielle, Gérard Depardieu and son Guillaume Depardieu, was a tremendous success in France and sold 2 million tickets in the first year, and was subsequently distributed in 31 countries. The soundtrack was certified platinum (500,000 copies) and made musician Jordi Savall an international star.
The film was released in 1992 in the US.
Quignard has also translated works from the Latin (Albucius, Porcius Latro), Chinese (Kong-souen Long), and Greek (Lycophron) languages.

Reviews

[Hugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

For me, tracing how thinking appeared first in homo sapiens through hunting tactics. If you think about perhaps vegetarian hominids and then learning to hunt animals even much larger than people. Tactics etc. So meeting predators on their own ground. Quite dramatic, and convincing. Quignard goes from there through 'diamons' as budding individuality to Socrates and his dramatic life and death. Socrates establishing (what Plato called) philosophy as the never ending quest. And as opposed to Christian thought, deemed guilt ridden and Roman thought deemed obedient (if I remember correctly).

I was reminded of one of the main ideas of Marxism, historical materialism, which postulates that there must be a material foundation for everything, and in this case even thought occurs for us at the atomic level, the literallyt physical, material level. Quignard postulates thought as a two part motion, always with a return:
"Around the head or muffle that moves forward, thought is initially a scenting, a sense of smell; the noos is initially a nostos; and the operation of thinking, the noesis, strives for the absolute return of that which it has scented among that which it scents. The depths of the body, in thought, seeking its sudden reunion with the lost object in the moment of impetus, in the unpredicable surging forth, in the suddenness of birth, runs towards a kind of first time that it re-joins in the feeding-dying. Everything runs towards spring (prin-temps) and, behind spring, towards birth."

I know this sounds a bit abstract but he builds up for this with much info, through the use of etymology and mythic stories, relations, interpretations, as well as observations and postulations of his own.

Poetic is the wording as he goes along with sheer fascination of discovery: "Lucidity is the joyous state of the human brain. The exact vision. Neither a magnifying effet, nor the blurred vision of the long-sighted person, nor the warping of short-sightedness, nor a distant telescopic impression accompianies such joy. The good functioning of the organ is the first joy. Distinct vison, a panorama lookout: lucidity is like a blue, aoristic, cloudless sky."

Highly enjoyable and recommended. Not sure where he stands amongst philosophers or the complete factual grounding of his approach, so open to more info on that.

[Lucas Gregori · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quignard trabaja con lo anterior a partir de lo anterior para pensar lo anterior. A veces sondea lugares que exceden mi capacidad pero aún de eso lo hace con una gran belleza literaria.

[Philippe Malzieu · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is the only book of the literary rentrée that I bought with the Salter. Quignard continues his essay of deconstruction of the novel. Ninth volume, 12 years since Abymes. I have the impression that it was yesterday. And with this book, one touches with essence: thought dead melancholy...

The style is dry, subject is grave. It's full of erudition as usual. It's a puzzle. I feel that Quignard thinks to his possible death. The tone is serious without unhappiness not a word of too. The nervous breakdown of Thomas D Aquin in 1273 Lacan Aristote Sextus Empiricus, Apulee, Plato, Plotin… Quignard convenes them all. More questions than of answers. But on such a question, there does not have univocal answers. Each one must have his own response.

[María]

"El pensamiento no es una opinión. Un sólo pensamiento puede ser verdadero contra 80 mil opiniones que concuerdan".
Quignard advierte: pensar es tan placentero como riesgoso. La persona que piensa está en el paraíso, pero, a su vez, puede quedarse solo ya que los otros no lo entienden.
Buena conclusión.

[Laurent Szklarz]

Si on arrive a passer outre de la difficulté et de l’érudition de l'auteur , on en tire pas mal de choses inintéressantes .

[José Miguel]

Este libro es dificil de puntuar. Es dificil valorar "intelectualmente" un texto que hace carne la manera de "pensar" de un autor que se aleja de lo convencional.

Es un autor que se pone antes que las palabras literalizantes y tiranas.

Este más bien deberia ser un libro sobre el silencio y sus paginas debieran estar en blanco.