Hélène Cixous (; ; born 5 June 1937) is a French
writer
A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, ...
,
playwright
A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes plays.
Etymology
The word "play" is from Middle English pleye, from Old English plæġ, pleġa, plæġa ("play, exercise; sport, game; drama, applause"). The word "wright" is an archaic English ...
and
literary critic
Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. ...
. She is known for her experimental writing style and great versatility as a writer and thinker, her work dealing with multiple
genres: theater, literary and feminist theory, art criticism, autobiography and poetic fiction.
Since 1967, she has published a considerable body of work consisting of some seventy titles, mainly published in the original French by
Grasset,
Gallimard,
Des femmes and
Galilée.
Cixous is perhaps best known for her 1976 article "
The Laugh of the Medusa
"The Laugh of the Medusa" is an essay by French feminist critic Hélène Cixous. Originally written in French as "Le Rire de la Méduse" in 1975, it was (after she revised it) translated into English by Paula Cohen and Keith Cohen in 1976. In the ...
",
which established her as one of the early thinkers in
post-structural feminism. Her plays have been directed by
Simone Benmussa
Simone Benmussa (5 June 1932 – 4 June 2001) was an Algerian born writer and theatre director in France. One of her best known plays was '' The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs''
Biography
She was born into a Jewish family in Tunis and attended ...
at the
Théâtre d'Orsay
The théâtre d'Orsay was a theater located on the rive gauche of the Seine, in the 7th arrondissement of Paris
It was inaugurated in 1972 in the former gare d'Orsay originally conceived by the architect Victor Laloux in 1898. Jean-Louis Barrau ...
, by
Daniel Mesguich
Daniel Mesguich (born 15 July 1952) is a French actor and director in theater and opera, and professor of stage acting school.
Biography
In 1970, he was admitted into the Conservatoire National Supérieur d'Art Dramatique, after which he opened ...
at the
Théâtre de la Ville and by
Ariane Mnouchkine at the
Théâtre du Soleil
Le Théâtre du Soleil (, "The Theater of the Sun") is a Parisian avant-garde stage ensemble founded by Ariane Mnouchkine, Philippe Léotard and fellow students of the ''L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq'' in 1964 as a collectiv ...
. During her academic career she was primarily associated with the Centre universitaire de Vincennes (today's
University of Paris VIII), where she founded the first centre of
women's studies
Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppress ...
at a European university.
Life and career
Personal life
Cixous was born in
Oran
Oran ( ar, وَهران, Wahrān) is a major coastal city located in the north-west of Algeria. It is considered the second most important city of Algeria after the capital Algiers, due to its population and commercial, industrial, and cultural ...
,
French Algeria
French Algeria (french: Alger to 1839, then afterwards; unofficially , ar, الجزائر المستعمرة), also known as Colonial Algeria, was the period of French colonisation of Algeria. French rule in the region began in 1830 with the ...
, to Jewish parents, Eve Cixous, née Klein, (1910–2013) and Georges Cixous (1909–1948).
Georges Cixous, a physician who had written his dissertation on tuberculosis, died of the disease in 1948. Eve Cixous became a midwife in
Algiers
Algiers ( ; ar, الجزائر, al-Jazāʾir; ber, Dzayer, script=Latn; french: Alger, ) is the capital and largest city of Algeria. The city's population at the 2008 Census was 2,988,145Census 14 April 2008: Office National des Statistiques d ...
following his death, "until her expulsion with the last French doctors and midwives in 1971."
Cixous' brother, Pierre, "a medical student and a supporter of
Algerian independence" was condemned to death in 1961 by the
Organisation Armée Secrète
The ''Organisation Armée Secrète'' (OAS, "Secret Armed Organisation") was a far-right French dissident paramilitary organisation during the Algerian War. The OAS carried out terrorist attacks, including bombings and assassinations, in an atte ...
, and joined Cixous in Bordeaux. Her mother and brother returned to Algeria following the country's independence in 1962. They were arrested, and Cixous "obtained their release with the help of
Ahmed Ben Bella's lawyer."
Cixous married Guy Berger in 1955, with whom she had three children, Anne-Emmanuelle (b. 1958), Stéphane (1960–1961), and Pierre-François (b. 1961). Cixous and Berger divorced in 1964.
Academic career
Cixous earned her
agrégation
In France, the ''agrégation'' () is a competitive examination for civil service in the French public education system. Candidates for the examination, or ''agrégatifs'', become ''agrégés'' once they are admitted to the position of ''profe ...
in English in 1959
and her ''
Doctorat ès lettres'' in 1968. Her main focus, at this time, was
English literature
English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...
and the works of
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the Modernism, modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important ...
. Cixous became ''assistante'' at the
University of Bordeaux
The University of Bordeaux (French: ''Université de Bordeaux'') is a Lists of universities in France, public university based in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in Southern France, southwestern France.
It has several campuses in the cities and towns of Bor ...
in 1962, served as ''maître assistante'' at
the Sorbonne
Sorbonne may refer to:
* Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities.
*the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970)
*one of its components or linked institution, ...
from 1965 to 1967, and was appointed ''maître de conférence'' at
Paris Nanterre University in 1967.
In 1968, following the
French student riots, Cixous was charged with founding the
University of Paris VIII, "created to serve as an alternative to the traditional French academic environment."
Cixous would, in 1974, found the University's center for
women's studies
Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppress ...
, the first in Europe.
Cixous is a professor at the University of Paris VIII and at the
European Graduate School in
Saas-Fee,
Switzerland
). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
.
Publications
In 1968, Cixous published her doctoral dissertation ''L'Exil de James Joyce ou l'Art du remplacement'' (''The Exile of James Joyce, or the Art of Displacement'') and the following year she published her first novel, ''Dedans'' (''Inside''), a semi-autobiographical work that won the
Prix Médicis.
She has published widely, including twenty-three volumes of poems, six books of essays, five plays, and numerous influential articles. She published ''Voiles'' (''Veils'') with
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida (; ; born Jackie Élie Derrida; See also . 15 July 1930 – 9 October 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher. He developed the philosophy of deconstruction, which he utilized in numerous texts, and which was developed th ...
and her work is often considered
deconstructive. In introducing her Wellek Lecture, subsequently published as ''Three Steps on the Ladder of Writing'', Derrida referred to her as the greatest living writer in his language (French). Cixous wrote a book on Derrida titled ''Portrait de Jacques Derrida en jeune saint juif'' (''Portrait of Jacques Derrida as a Young Jewish Saint''). Her reading of Derrida finds additional layers of meaning at a
phonemic
In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language.
For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west ...
rather than strictly
lexical level. In addition to Derrida and Joyce, she has written
monograph
A monograph is a specialist work of writing (in contrast to reference works) or exhibition on a single subject or an aspect of a subject, often by a single author or artist, and usually on a scholarly subject.
In library cataloging, ''monogra ...
s on the work of the Brazilian writer
Clarice Lispector
Clarice Lispector (born Chaya Pinkhasivna Lispector ( uk, Хая Пінкасівна Ліспектор); December 10, 1920December 9, 1977) was a Ukrainian-born Brazilian novelist and short story writer. Her innovative, idiosyncratic works ex ...
, on
Maurice Blanchot,
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka (3 July 1883 – 3 June 1924) was a German-speaking Bohemian novelist and short-story writer, widely regarded as one of the major figures of 20th-century literature. His work fuses elements of realism and the fantastic. It typ ...
,
Heinrich von Kleist
Bernd Heinrich Wilhelm von Kleist (18 October 177721 November 1811) was a German poet, dramatist, novelist, short story writer and journalist. His best known works are the theatre plays '' Das Käthchen von Heilbronn'', ''The Broken Jug'', ''Amph ...
,
Michel de Montaigne
Michel Eyquem, Sieur de Montaigne ( ; ; 28 February 1533 – 13 September 1592), also known as the Lord of Montaigne, was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance. He is known for popularizing the essay as a lit ...
,
Ingeborg Bachmann
Ingeborg Bachmann (25 June 1926 – 17 October 1973) was an Austrian poet and author.
Biography
Bachmann was born in Klagenfurt, in the Austrian state of Carinthia, the daughter of Olga (née Haas) and Matthias Bachmann, a schoolteacher. Her f ...
,
Thomas Bernhard
Nicolaas Thomas Bernhard (; 9 February 1931 – 12 February 1989) was an Austrian novelist, playwright and poet who explored death, social injustice, and human misery in controversial literature that was deeply pessimistic about modern civiliza ...
, and the Russian poet
Marina Tsvetaeva. Cixous is also the author of essays on artists, including
Simon Hantaï,
Pierre Alechinsky
Pierre Alechinsky (born 19 October 1927) is a Belgian artist. He has lived and worked in France since 1951. His work is related to tachisme, abstract expressionism, and lyrical abstraction.
Life
Alechinsky was born in Schaerbeek. In 1944 he ...
and
Adel Abdessemed
Adel Abdessemed (born 1971) is an Algerian-French contemporary artist. He has worked in a variety of media, including animation, installation, performance, sculpture and video. Some of his work relates to the topic of violence in the world ...
to whom she has devoted two books.
Along with
Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray (born 3 May 1930) is a Belgian-born French feminist, philosopher, linguist, psycholinguist, psychoanalyst, and cultural theorist who examined the uses and misuses of language in relation to women. Irigaray's first and most well kn ...
and
Julia Kristeva
Julia Kristeva (; born Yuliya Stoyanova Krasteva, bg, Юлия Стоянова Кръстева; on 24 June 1941) is a Bulgarian-French philosopher, literary critic, semiotician, psychoanalyst, feminist, and, most recently, novelist, who ha ...
, Cixous is considered one of the mothers of
poststructuralist feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, fictional, or philosophical discourse. It aims to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines women's and men's social roles, experiences, interests, chores, and femin ...
.
In the 1970s, Cixous began writing about the relationship between
sexuality
Human sexuality is the way people experience and express themselves sexually. This involves biological, psychological, physical, erotic, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. Because it is a broad term, which has varied wit ...
and language. Like other poststructuralist feminist theorists, Cixous believes that our sexuality is directly tied to how we communicate in society. In 1975, Cixous published her most influential article "Le rire de la méduse" ("The Laugh of the Medusa"), which was revised by her, translated into English by Paula Cohen and Keith Cohen, and released in English in 1976.
She has published over 70 works; her fiction, dramatic writing, and poetry, however, are not often read in English.
The Bibliothèque nationale de France
In 2000, a collection in Cixous' name was created at the
Bibliothèque nationale de France
The Bibliothèque nationale de France (, 'National Library of France'; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites known respectively as ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository ...
after Cixous donated the entirety of her manuscripts to date. They then featured in the exhibit "Brouillons d'écrivains" held there in 2001.
In 2003, the Bibliothèque held the conference "Genèses Généalogies Genres: Autour de l'oeuvre d'Hélène Cixous". Among the speakers were Mireille Calle-Gruber, Marie Odile Germain, Jacques Derrida, Annie Leclerc, Ariane Mnouchkine, Ginette Michaud, and Cixous herself.
Film
Hélène Cixous is featured in
Olivier Morel's 118-minute film ''Ever, Rêve, Hélène Cixous'' (France, USA, 2018).
Accolades and awards
Cixous holds honorary degrees from
Queen's University and the
University of Alberta
The University of Alberta, also known as U of A or UAlberta, is a Public university, public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It was founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford,"A Gentleman of Strathcona – Alexande ...
in Canada;
University College Dublin
University College Dublin (commonly referred to as UCD) ( ga, Coláiste na hOllscoile, Baile Átha Cliath) is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a member institution of the National University of Ireland. With 33,284 student ...
in Ireland; the
University of York
The University of York (abbreviated as or ''York'' for post-nominals) is a collegiate research university, located in the city of York, England. Established in 1963, the university has expanded to more than thirty departments and centres, co ...
and
University College London
, mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £143 million (2020)
, budget = ...
in the UK; and
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private research university in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll in 1789 as Georgetown College, the university has grown to comprise eleven undergraduate and graduate ...
,
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world.
Charte ...
, and the
University of Wisconsin–Madison
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United Stat ...
in the USA. In 2008 she was appointed as A.D. White Professor-at-Large at
Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...
until June 2014.
Influences on Cixous' writing
Some of the most notable influences on her writings have been
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida (; ; born Jackie Élie Derrida; See also . 15 July 1930 – 9 October 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher. He developed the philosophy of deconstruction, which he utilized in numerous texts, and which was developed th ...
,
Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts i ...
,
Jacques Lacan
Jacques Marie Émile Lacan (, , ; 13 April 1901 – 9 September 1981) was a French psychoanalyst and psychiatrist. Described as "the most controversial psycho-analyst since Freud", Lacan gave yearly seminars in Paris from 1953 to 1981, and ...
and
Arthur Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (, ; 20 October 1854 – 10 November 1891) was a French poet known for his transgressive and surreal themes and for his influence on modern literature and arts, prefiguring surrealism. Born in Charleville, he start ...
.
Sigmund Freud
Psychoanalyst
PsychoanalysisFrom Greek: + . is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques"What is psychoanalysis? Of course, one is supposed to answer that it is many things — a theory, a research method, a therapy, a body of knowledge. In what might ...
Sigmund Freud established the initial theories that would serve as a basis for some of Cixous' arguments in developmental psychology. Freud's analysis of gender roles and sexual identity concluded with separate paths for boys and girls through the Oedipus complex, theories of which Cixous was particularly critical.
Jacques Derrida
Contemporaries, lifelong friends, and intellectuals,
Jacques Derrida
Jacques Derrida (; ; born Jackie Élie Derrida; See also . 15 July 1930 – 9 October 2004) was an Algerian-born French philosopher. He developed the philosophy of deconstruction, which he utilized in numerous texts, and which was developed th ...
and Cixous both grew up as French Jews in Algeria and share a "belonging constituted of exclusion and nonbelonging"—not Algerian, rejected by France, their Jewishness concealed or acculturated. In Derrida's family "one never said 'circumcision' but 'baptism,' not 'Bar Mitzvah' but 'communion.'" Judaism cloaked in Catholicism is one example of the undecidability of identity that influenced the thinker whom Cixous calls a "Jewish Saint". Her book ''Portrait of Jacques Derrida as a Young Jewish Saint'' addresses these matters.
Through
deconstruction
The term deconstruction refers to approaches to understanding the relationship between text and meaning. It was introduced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who defined it as a turn away from Platonism's ideas of "true" forms and essen ...
, Derrida employed the term ''
logocentrism'' (which was not his coinage). This is the concept that explains how language relies on a
hierarchical
A hierarchy (from Greek: , from , 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy is an important ...
system that values the spoken word over the written word in
Western culture
Leonardo da Vinci's ''Vitruvian Man''. Based on the correlations of ideal Body proportions">human proportions with geometry described by the ancient Roman architect Vitruvius in Book III of his treatise ''De architectura''.
image:Plato Pio-Cle ...
. The idea of
binary opposition
A binary opposition (also binary system) is a pair of related terms or concepts that are opposite in meaning. Binary opposition is the system of language and/or thought by which two theoretical opposites are strictly defined and set off against one ...
is essential to Cixous' position on language.
Cixous and
Luce Irigaray
Luce Irigaray (born 3 May 1930) is a Belgian-born French feminist, philosopher, linguist, psycholinguist, psychoanalyst, and cultural theorist who examined the uses and misuses of language in relation to women. Irigaray's first and most well kn ...
combined Derrida's logocentric idea and Lacan's symbol for desire, creating the term ''
phallogocentrism''. This term focuses on Derrida's social structure of speech and binary opposition as the center of reference for language, with the phallic being privileged and how women are only defined by what they lack; not A vs. B, but, rather A vs. ¬A (
not-A).
In a dialogue between Derrida and Cixous, Derrida said about Cixous: "Helene's texts are translated across the world, but they remain untranslatable. We are two French writers who cultivate a strange relationship, or a strangely familiar relationship with the French language – at once more translated and more untranslatable than many a French author. We are more rooted in the French language than those with ancestral roots in this culture and this land."
Major works
''The Laugh of the Medusa'' (1975)
Cixous' critical feminist essay "The Laugh of the Medusa", originally written in French as ''Le Rire de la Méduse'' in 1975, was (after she revised it) translated into English by Paula Cohen and Keith Cohen in 1976.
It has become a seminal essay, particularly because it announces what Cixous called ''
écriture féminine'', a distinctive mode of writing for women and by women.
Bibliography
Published in English
Selected books
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* co-authored with Jacques Derrida.
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* Foreword by Jacques Derrida.
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Plays
* "The Conquest of the School at Madhubai," trans. Carpenter, Deborah. 1986.
* "The Name of Oedipus," trans. Christiane Makward & Miller, Judith. In: ''Out of Bounds: Women's Theatre in French.'' Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. 1992.
* "The Terrible but Unfinished Story of Norodom Sihanouk, King of Cambodia," trans. Juliet Flower MacCannell, Judith Pike, and Lollie Groth. University of Nebraska Press, 1994.
Published in French
Criticism
* ''L'Exil de James Joyce ou l'Art du remplacement'' (The Exile of James Joyce, or the Art of Displacement). 1969 (1985).
*
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Books
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Theater
* ''La Pupulle'', Cahiers Renaud-Barrault,
Gallimard, 1971.
* ''Portrait de Dora'', Des femmes, 1976.
* ''Le Nom d'Oedipe. Chant du corps interdit'', Des femmes, 1978.
* ''La Prise de l'école de Madhubaï'', Avant-scène du Théâtre, 1984.
* ''L'Histoire terrible mais inachevée de Norodom Sihanouk, roi du Cambodge'',
Théâtre du Soleil
Le Théâtre du Soleil (, "The Theater of the Sun") is a Parisian avant-garde stage ensemble founded by Ariane Mnouchkine, Philippe Léotard and fellow students of the ''L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq'' in 1964 as a collectiv ...
, 1985.
* ''Théâtre'', Des femmes, 1986.
* ''L'Indiade, ou l'Inde de leurs rêves'', Théâtre du Soleil, 1987.
* ''On ne part pas, on ne revient pas'', Des femmes, 1991.
* ''Les Euménides d'Eschyle'' (traduction), Théâtre du Soleil, 1992.
* ''L'Histoire (qu'on ne connaîtra jamais)'', Des femmes, 1994.
* "''Voile Noire Voile Blanche'' / Black Sail White Sail", bilingual, trad. Catherine A.F. MacGillivray, New Literary History 25, 2 (Spring), Minnesota University Press, 1994.
* ''La Ville parjure ou le Réveil des Érinyes'', Théâtre du Soleil, 1994.
* ''Jokasta'', libretto to the opera of Ruth Schönthal, 1997.
* ''Tambours sur la digue'', Théâtre du Soleil, 1999.
* ''Rouen, la Trentième Nuit de Mai '31'', Galilée, 2001.
* ''Le Dernier Caravansérail'', Théâtre du Soleil, 2003.
* ''Les Naufragés du Fol Espoir'', Théâtre du Soleil, 2010.
Selected essays
* ''L'Exil de James Joyce ou l'Art du remplacement'' (doctoral thesis), Grasset, 1969.
* ''Prénoms de personne'', Le Seuil, 1974.
* ''The Exile of James Joyce or the Art of Replacement'' (translation by
Sally Purcell of ''L'exil de James Joyce ou l'Art du remplacement''). New York: David Lewis, 1980.
* ''Un K. Incompréhensible : Pierre Goldman'', Christian Bourgois, 1975.
* ''La Jeune Née'', with Catherine Clément, 10/18, 1975.
* ''La Venue à l'écriture'', with
Madeleine Gagnon and Annie Leclerc, 10/18, 1977.
* ''Entre l'écriture'', Des femmes, 1986.
* ''L'Heure de Clarice Lispector'', Des femmes, 1989.
* ''Photos de racines'', with Mireille Calle-Gruber, Des femmes, 1994.
* ''Lettre à Zohra Drif'', 1998
* ''Portrait de Jacques Derrida en Jeune Saint Juif'', Galilée, 2001.
* ''Rencontre terrestre'', with Frédéric-Yves Jeannet, Galilée, 2005.
* ''Le Tablier de Simon Hantaï'', 2005.
* ''Insister''. À Jacques Derrida, Galilée, 2006.
* ''Le Voisin de zéro : Sam Beckett'', Galilée, 2007
* ''Défions l'augure'' (on the quote 'we defy augury' from
Hamlet
''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depicts ...
), Galilée, 2018
See also
*
Antinarcissism
*
List of deconstructionists
This is a list of thinkers who have been dealt with deconstruction, a term developed by French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930-2004).
__NOTOC__
The thinkers included in this list ''have Wikipedia pages'' and satisfy at least one of the three ...
*
Jean-Louis de Rambures, "Comment travaillent les écrivains", Paris 1978 (interview with H. Cixous)
*
Phallic monism
References
Further reading
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External links
"The Laugh of the Medusa", by Hélène Cixous, translated into English by Keith Cohen and Paula Cohen* approach the notion of affinity through a discussion of "Disruptive Kinship," co-sponsored by Villa Gillet and the School of Writing at The New School for Public Engagement.
Mary Jane Parrine: Stanford Presidential Lectures' Cixous pageCarola Hilfrich: Hélène Cixous Biography at ''Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia''
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