Testimony, poem, ashes: Paul celan and jacques derrida

Abstract

This paper tackles the lecture carried out by Derrida of Celan’s work, from Schibboleth (1986) to the seminar The Beast and the Sovereign (2001-2003), focusing on the concepts of “testimony” and “secret”. Thus, it is showed how Celan is a major interlocutor to Derrida, who does not develop just a hermeneutical reading which may take out the concealed meaning of his poems but experiences in Celan’s poetry the aporia of memory and of reading, the im-possibility of the testimony in the poem and so the necessity of the impossible affirmation of mourning and translation. In this way, the relation between Celan and Derrida is understood as task of endless lecture, that is to say, as a task for justice and for promise.