Something Speaks to Me

Michel Chaouli is professor of German and comparative literature at Indiana University Bloomington, where he also directs the Center for Theoretical Inquiry in the Humanities. His recent publications include Thinking with Kant’s “Critique of Judgment” and the coedited volume Poetic Critique: Encounters with Art and Literature.

• To Start  Part 1. Something Speaks to Me (Intimacy)Feeling the Pulse of the TextSome ExamplesPoetic Criticism, an EssayRoland Barthes Has SushiWhat Does the Text Want from Me?The Impersonality of IntimacyThe Texture of IntimacyProductive DistrustLearning to UnlearnNaïvetéIntimacy, Self-TaughtThe Call of SignificanceThe Authority of the PoeticBeing in HistoryBeing in the Same History (Tradition)A Bastard of History  Part 2. I Must Tell You about It (Urgency)Understanding and MakingMaking the New by Remaking the OldLearning Not to ConcludeTactPlaying It by EarPoetic Making Conserves as It RenewsPoetic PowerPhilological DisarmamentHearing That We May SpeakSecond ThoughtsSelf-Reference versus UrgencyEpiphaniesThe Intense Life of LanguageWhat and HowThe Knot of ExperienceMaking Freedom  Part 3. But I Don’t Know How (Opacity)Shadow in Plain SightThe Difficulty of CriticismThe Strange VoiceAristotle versus PlatoWhat in Technique Is More Than TechniqueWhat Kind of Thing Is the Poetic Thing?The Work of Art versus the Poetic WorkThe Eye of the Work, the Eye of the BeholderHow to Leap Over One’s Own ShadowWhy Non-Knowing Is the Primal Condition of PoetryGeniusCriticism Is MakingThe Poet of the PoetFallingThe Difficulty, and the Ecstasy, of RealityIs Poetry a Deflection from Life?In Poetry, Non-Knowing Is a Primal ConditionThe Social Force of the Impersonal  To Be Continued . . .  AcknowledgmentsNotesIndex

“If, as Michel Chaouli suggests, there is no greater compliment to pay a work than ‘to credit it with the power of arousing the urge of making,’ then this book deserves that high praise. I left its pages grateful to the author for articulating things I’ve thought but didn’t yet have words for, as well as for articulating ideas that hadn’t yet occurred to me. Chaouli’s prose is patient and pellucid at every turn without ever sacrificing passion or complexity. His book renews my excitement about—and dedication to—poetic criticism, not to mention the sustaining arts of connection and conversation.”