To Be Two

by Luce Irigaray

In this major new work, French philosopher Luce Irigaray continues to explore the issue central to her the feminist redefinition of Being and Identity. For Irigaray, the notion of the individual is twinned with a reconceived notion of difference, or alterity. What does it mean to be someone? How can identity be created, or discovered, in relation to others? In To Be Two Irigaray gives new clarity to her project, grounding it in relation to such major figures as Sartre, Levinas, and Merleau-Ponty. Yet at the same time, she enriches her discussion with an attempt to bring the elements--earth, fire, water--into philosophical discourse. Even the polarities of heaven and earth come to play in this ambitious and provocative text. At once political, philosophical, and poetic, To Be Two will become one of Irigarary's central works.

Genres: Philosophy, Feminism, Love

136 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 1, 1994

About the author

Luce Irigaray is a Belgian-born French feminist, philosopher, linguist, psycholinguist, psychoanalyst and cultural theorist. She is best known for her works Speculum of the Other Woman and This Sex Which Is Not One. Presently, she is active in the Women's Movements in both France and Italy.

Reviews

[Nessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

The French feminist philosopher Luce Irigaray puts forth her philosophy of the caress. In her philosophy of the caress, inter-subjectivity is not something created above the lovers, thus not the vertical transcendence that Sartre perpetuated in Being and Nothingness. Instead, love is a horizontal transcendence in-between to embodied conscious beings. Her theory shatters the alienating accounts of sexuality put forth by many male philosophers throughout history, making sexual experiences liberating and non-hierarchical.

I miss studying her in school!!

[Shiva · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I've ever read in French!
Usually during the reading I'm too hard on myself... I don't want things to get exhausting... if I see that not enough pleasure is there for me I give up on things to save myself and my poor time. This was one of the rarest works through which I didn't have to worry about anything... I devoured each line. I tried to take every bit in... to savor the experience. You're a genius dear Luce Irigaray. Thanks for making me believe in the power of great books once again!

[Skyelis Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

sometimes i think i might die because she is so good.

[Alex Lee · Rating 2 out of 5]

Irigaray explores the alterity of Other through this text, wondering if there is a morality of the other, wherein there is a place for morality and understanding when one is radically different. She explores the limits of the One to come to two, finding only an eroticism on the surface, where equality and negative space are the morality of respect and understanding. There seems to be only an availability of desire for the other as a union that preserves two even as it takes one to be its model.

It seems with alterity there can only be respect for an empty seat, wherein the Other can become transhuman, post-signification and its own inherent position rather than a knowable defined entity. In this sense, 2 is the minimal difference that allows for the presentation of n+: "to be two" might as well be called "to be n+". While Irigaray does not go this far, she does open the door to allow us to see that the logic of two carries with it an inherent instability that cannot be since the actual position is a multiplicity that must be cohered. 2 (not n) carries with it a latent particularity that cannot hold as 2 since the logic is actually the classhood of the multiple, of not one completeness but multiple.

[Mattia Agnelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Lasciar essere l'altro, possederlo per niente, contemplarlo come una presenza irriducibile, assaporarlo in quanto è un bene inappropriabile, vederlo, ascoltarlo, toccarlo, sapendo che ciò che percepisco non è mio. Sentito da me, pur rimanendo altro, mai ridotto a un oggetto. Ricevuto senza che nessuno(a) rinunci a sé, se non nell'abbandono a essere custodita(o) dall'altro. Quasi nessuna traccia di esteriorità sussiste in questa condivisione, a parte una memoria fedele e, forse, un'alleanza.”


“Perché l'altro che mi guarda durante o dopo l'amore può ferirmi? Egli guarda un oggetto, non un soggetto. È infedele a un'intenzione, a un'interiorità, a uno sguardo condivisibile.”


“La percezione sembra convenire alla vita, mentre la sensazione sarebbe piuttosto un cammino verso la morte. Coltivare la percezione significa essere attenti(e) alle qualità, sia di ciò che è percepito, sia di chi percepisce. L'economia della sensazione è più quantitativa che qualitativa: il sentire vuole sempre crescere in intensità e procede così fino alla morte per mancanza di regolazioni. Il sadico e il masochista infatti giocano con la morte. Fra due viventi, la sensibilità fluttua, se è fedele alla percezione. L'altro cambia, e cambio anch'io. Se tu rimani vivente, il mio sguardo, i miei sensi sono sempre destati dalle tue intenzioni presenti, e non posso addormentarmi nel sapere di te, la ripetizione del già sentito da te, finché una sensazione più forte mi sveglia. I tuoi gesti, se sono ispirati dal tuo volere, interessano la mia attenzione, il mio sguardo. Il suo orizzonte non si chiude, ma rimane aperto sul tuo mistero, sull' irriducibilità della tua libertà, della tua intenzione. Rivolti verso di te, i miei occhi sono centrati su di te, ma non hanno già, dentro, un'immagine o uno spettacolo. Sono ancora e sempre vergini nel guardare a te, all'espressione del tuo volere.”

[Erica Eller · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is very steeped in responding to the problems of specific philosophers (Sartre, Hegel, Heidegger, and Merleau Ponty) have with gender. The contemplation of self and other is very steeped in a Christian patriarchal philosophical history. And the result produces a work indebted to these patriarchal efforts at grappling with the problem of transcendental breaks from sound philosophy, while citing zero (correct me if I'm wrong) females as sources for her philosophical grounding. I'd call this breaking with tradition without unbuckling the leash. It gave me a bit of whiplash to read it.

[sheena d! · Rating 3 out of 5]

Do I not understand this book because I have never acknowledged or escaped the dichotomy between subject and other? Because I have never been in love? Or do I not understand this book because I am a fool? HUM. May my undergraduate relationship with Irigaray rest in sweet, sweet peace.