Writing as a technology of the self in Kierkegaard and Foucault

Writing as a technology of the self in Kierkegaard and Foucault William McDonald University of New England. Philosophy Department Armidale, NSW, 235 1 (Australia). Data de recepcio: 111 01 1995 Abstract ,. - -- - Writing is a very important means by which we can work on ourselves. Yet as a ((technology of the self}} writing has changed substantially at different timcs during European history. This essay sketches some of the crucial characteristics of wriring as a technology of the self for Plato's contemporaries, for rhe early church fathers, and then for Peter Abclard. The changes exemplified in the confessional writing of AbeIard became the platform for writing as a technology of the sclf in European modernism. 'l'hc characteristics of modernist writing as a technology of the self are examined in some detail in the work of Kierkegaard, particularly wirh respecr ro his aesthetic writings and his use of multiple narrative voices. Kierkegaard's uses of writing are compared and contrasted with rhose of Baudelaire and Foucault. Key words: Kierkegaard, Foucault, Abelard, writing, technologies of the seIf, transfiguration, Romanticism, modernism. Resum. L 'escriptura corm a tecrrohgia del jo en Kzerkegaard i Foucault . - . . Lcriure h un importanr mitj9 amb cl qud podern acruar sub re nosdrres marcixos. Tanmatrix, corn a ~(tecnologia dcl OR, l'escriptura ha canviar substancialmenr tn el tcmps duranr la hisrbria europea. Aquest assaig esbossa algunes dc les caracteristiqucs m6 rellcvants de I'escriprura corn a recnologia del jo per als contemporanis dc Plato, pcr als primers pares de l'esglhia i per a Pere Abelard. Els canvis exemplificaw cn I'escriptura confessional d'fielard varcn esdevenir la plaraforma per a l'escriprura corn una rccnologia dcl jo en la modernitat europea. k ~aracteristiques de l'cscriprura de la modernirat en rant quc recnologia del jn s6n examinades arnb cert decal1 en l'obra de Kierkegaard, parricularment en rclaci6 amb els scus escrits esrttiu i el seu us de mliltiples veus narracivcs. Us usos Kierkegaardians dc I'cscriptura s6n comparats i conrrastats arnb els de Baudelaire i Fouault. Paraules clau: Kierkegaard, Foucault, Abelard, escriptura, tecnologia del jo, transfiguraci6, Romanticisme, modernitar Iiteriria. , . . . Sumari Introduction l'art 11: Kierkegaard's EirherlOr Part I: Previous Uses ofwriting Conclusion as a Technology of the Self 56 Enrahonar 25, 1996 Wiiliam McDondd Introduction Kierkegaard used writing for a variety of purposes: to communicate (indirectly); to explore (subjective) truth; to push discursive reason to its limits; to engage in <<conversation» with the writings of philosophers, theologians and literary figures present and past. He also used writing as a technology for working upon himself. The use he made of this technology in working upon himself is significantly different from writing as a technology of the self in other eras. Its use shares substantial features with that of Baudelaire, and subsequently that of Michel Foucault. Kierkegaard's use of writing as a technology of the self also diverges significantly from that of Baudelaire and Foucault. In this paper 1 will situate Kierkegaard's writing as a technology of the self by contrasting it with other significant uses in European history. But 1 will confine my remarks about Kierkegaard's writing mainly to his practices in EitberlOr. Part 1: Previous Uses of Writing as a Technology of the Self 1. PLatoi Greece Plato's discussion in the Pbaedrus is one of the earliest problematizations of writing in European philosophy. As Derrida's discussion in ((Plato's Pharmacy))' has shown us, Plato's apparent privileging of speech over writing in this dialogue is not as straightforward as it seems. Derrida's strategy is to deconstruct the hierarchy Plato has established between speech and writing by exposing the ambiguity of the pivotal term ((pharmakon)) . Derrida seeks to make a general point about the relations benveen speech and writing, in pursuit of his critique of the metaphysics of presence. What he overlooks is the historical context of Plato's discussion. Why was Plato even concerned with the question of writing? Why did he problematize writing with respect to memory? The answer is that Plato was responding polemically to a new use of writing which was much in vogue in contemporary Greek society. This was the use of hypornnernata or notebooks, both in personal life and in business and administration. As the name of these notebooks suggests, they were conceived primarily as a mnemonic aid. Civic oficials, heads of households, merchants, ctc., used notebooks to jot down ideas, appointments, things to be remembered. These notes then formed the raw data for reorganizing the enterprise, for improving management, for increasing efficiency or productivity. The raw data might come from ideas spontaneously occurring to the notetaker, or from things seen, heard, or read about. 1. Jacques Derrida, <(Plato's Pharrnacyx in Dirremination, translared by Barbara Johnson, University of Chicago Press, 1981: 61-171. Wriring as a rechnology of the self in Kierkegaard and Foucault Enrahonar 25, 1996 57 Much the same use was made of the notebooks in personal life. The private individual noted things he2 thought worth remembering. These might simply be things that he needed or wanted to remember to do, or they might be ideas that would aid with selfmanagement. For example, if some observed behaviour were seen to be effective for the management of envy or greed or suffering, or to help someone be more energetic or happy, it could be noted in writing for future reference. The notebook then became a data bank which could be meditated on, organized, systematically reconstructed, so that it could form the basis of a program of self-management. Self-mastery, by subordinating the unruly appetites to reason, was already a widespread aspiration among aristocratic Greek men. It was articulated strongly by Plato. For example, the Phaed rus contains an extended discussion of desire and erotic love, and the need to control these powerful forces with reason. To illustrate, Plato used the image of the soul as a chariot drawn by two horses: the horses are honour and appetite, the charioteer reason. Ethics in this context is largely a matter of prudential ~elfmana~ernent, using a hierarchical organization of faculties and drives. The manner of organization was modelled on the domestic economy, with reason in control. So summarize, writing was used as a technology of the self in this context to serve the goal of self-mastery. Its relevant features for this purpose were that it acted as a memory bank, whose resources could be drawn upon as required. Furthermore, it rendered observations and memories in a form which allowed for their rational reorganization. Personal data in the memory bank could be used for self-transformation by modelling one's life on the rationally reconstructed writing. The aim of self-mastery was to augment pleasure, or to satisfy interests, at least insofar as these were compatible with an honourable life. II. Early Church Fathers Many of the early church fathers also practised writing as a means of worhng on themselves. But there were significant differences benveen their use of writing and that of Plato's contemporaries. According to Foucault, the most significant difference was that the early church fathers used writing primarily as a means of self-interpretation3. Christianity, for Foucault, is characterized by a ~hermeneutics of suspicionn (the phrase is Paul Ricoeur's). Thoughts are not always what they seem to be: they often contain indirect evidence of sinful attitudes and satanic influences. The inner is not the outer. It is necessary to be vigilant with respect to one's innermost self, to see that it is not wandering off the true path to salvation. The technology of writing about oneself is aimed not at self-mas- tery for its own sake, but at purity so that one conforms to the word of God. 2. NB: The hypomnemata were used primarily by men. 3. Cf. Michel Foucaulc, The Care of the Se& the Histo~ of Sexualiq, Volurne 3, rranslaced by Robert Hurley, Vintage, 1986: 239. 58 Enrahonar 25, 1996 Williarn McDonald It is not a prudential self-management so that one attains a maximum of pleasure or satisfaction of interests, but a self-purification in order to purge oneself of the unholy and become closer to God. Autobiographical writing at this time was primarily a means of confessing one's innermost thoughts, so as to expose them to objective scrutiny (whether another's, or one's own at another time, or God's). Greek writing about the self had confined itself to phenomena things as they appeared on the surface; thoughts observed, or acquired, or spontaneously occurring. These phenomena were then rearranged. But Christian writing was suspicious; it sought to delve beneath the surface appearances and uncover the innermost secrets of the seif, It assurned the self was open to subde deceptions. Only the most rigorous pursuit of truth, guided by the firmest religious faith could cut through the layers of deception. This use of writing about the self was ultimately appropriated by the church in the practice of confession. Confession even became a compulsory annual practice for al1 parishioners by the decree of the Fourth Lateran Council in 121 5. It formed a crucial stage in the development of a self who seeks its truth rather than a self who seeks to style itself. An important additional feature of this early Christian confessional writing is that the subject's life is presented as an exemplar offered up to God. The confssio, as a form of writing, was always mediated by a relationship with God. In Augustine's Confssions, for example, the aim is to praise divine goodness and mercy rather than to reveal idiosyncratic episodes from the life of Augustine as a unique individual. Personal revelations are only made insofar as they relate to the fortunes of Christianity as a whole4. While suspicious self-scrutiny was set in train by this practice (in speech and in writing), its domain was restricred to spiritual self-scrutiny with respect to sinful, or potentially sinful, thoughts and behaviour5. III. Abelard? Autobiographical Writing In his autobiography, The Histo y ofMy Calamities, Peter Abelard made a substantial departure from this mode of confessional writing. Abelard wished to reveal himself as a unique individual whose biography could not be confused with anyone else's. He revelled in his idi~s~ncrasies. He revealed facts about his life which could not be socially approved. 4. Cf. N.F. Cantor, Medieval History, Macmillan, 1969: 363. 5. Cf. Augustine: a0 Lord, my Helper and my Redeemer, 1 shall now te11 and confess to [he glory of your name how you released me from the fetrers of lust which held me so tightly shackled and from my slavery to rhe things of this world),; Guibert of Nogent: e1 confess to Thy Majesty, O God, my endless wanderings from Thy paths, and my turning back so often to he bosom of Thy Mercy, directed by Thee in spite of all. 1 confess the wickedness 1 did in childhood and in youth, wickedness that yet boils up in my mature years, and my ingrained love of crookedness, which still lives on in the sluggishness of my worn b0dy.n Both quoted in Philip Barker, Michel Foucault: ~subversions of the subject, Allen & Unwin, 1994: 134-135. Writing as a rechnology of rhe self in Kierkegaard and Foucault Enrahonar 25, 1996 59 Abelard's writing about himself can be distinguished from that of his predecessors in the following ways. There is no mediation by God; there is only the self-reflection of the writer. This self-reflection is used in a project of selfconstruction, like the Greek use of hypomnemata, but it is directed by a quest for the truth about himself rather than by prudential self-management. Abelard's ethics has as a theme, know thyselJ: so that his autobiography poses two questions: (1) Who is responsible for the life of the subject that 1 arn? and (11) How did 1 become the subject that 1 am? Abelard sought to be perfectly honest about himself, in order that he appear as a transparent subject. This transparent subject was to be the foundation for his reasoning. Rather than exercising a hermeneutics of suspicion, Abelard pursued a rigorous methodological scepticism. This raises a problem since the scepticism requires a grounding in a transparent subject, but if it is so grounded the scepticism evaporates. If there is no such grounding, then the subject of doubt itself becomes open to doubt, and madness threatens. Descartes was faced with the same problem, but evaded it by excluding by fiat the possibility of himself being mad6. Abelard adopted a similar solution, which, has become associated with the continued use of this methodological doubt, viz. he built a system. He created a world dominated by his own philosophical and methodological system, so that the innerlouter distinction collapsed and reality was made to agree with his individual subjective philosophical perspective7. But the whole system was potentially unstable due to the ambivalence between the opacity and transparency of the subject at its origin. This is the point of departure 1 wish to take for a discussion of the use Kierkegaard makes of confessional writing as a technology of the self. Although the first volume of Ezjber/Or is quite explicitly a critique of the self-construc- tive techniques of the German Romantics, it both draws on and undermines Abelard's autobiographical technology for creating the self-reflexive, transparent subject of reason. Part 11: Kierkegaard's EitherlOr The first volume of Either/Or is presented as a collection of papers written by an aesthete. They have been published by the pseudonymous editor Victor Eremita, who has taken the liberty of using a phrase from two of the scraps of paper to serve as an epigraph for the first section of the volume. This phrase, ad se ipsum (to himself), might just as well have been used as an epi- 6. Cf. Michel Foucaulr's dispute with Derrida over the status of rnadness in Descartes Meditations. See Jacques Derrida, ~Cogito and the History of Madnessn, in Wriring and Difference, translaced by Alan Bass, Rourledge & Kegan Paul, 1978: 31-63; and Michel Foucault, <<My Body, This Paper, This Fires, translated by Geoffrey Benningron, Oxford Literay Review, vol. 4, 1979: 9-28. 7. Philip Barker, op. cit., 147. GO Enrahonar 25, 1996 William McDonald graph to the whole volume. The writings of the aesthete are to himself, for himself. The aesthete uses writing as a means of producing himself. He reflects on things in the world, and then reflects on his reflections. He jots down notes on bits of paper as they occur to him, perhaps to meditate on them later. In fact the phrase ((ad se ipsum)) is the Latin translation of the Greek title of Marcus Aurelius Meditations. In one of the diapsalmata, the aphoristic fragments which form the first section of the aesthete's papers, the aesthete adverts explicitly to the diary as an instrument for aiding memory: «If any man needs to keep a diary, 1 do, and that for the purpose of assisting my memory) (E O, 1: 32). It seems at first glance, that we have a resurrection of the hypomnemata as a technology of the self. But it is clear from the preface by Victor Eremita, and from numerous passages in the aesthete's own papers, that these writings also share features with the Christian tradition of hermeneutic suspicion. The very first line of Eremita's preface introduces the distinction between the interna1 and the external. When he notices contradictions benveen what he hears and what he sees in a person, he suspects inner secrets. The pursuit of these secrets is one of the passions of Eremita's life. He also uses the image of the confessional on the first page of his preface. But the priest in the confessional is not in a position o observe the telling contradictions which reveal conceded inwardness, since the priest only hears a voice. On the basis of the heard voice the priest ((constructs an ounvard appearance which corresponds to the voice he hears)) (E O, 1: 3). In this way the confessing subject becomes cctransparent)) to the priest in the same manner as Abelard's self becomes ((transparent)) to himself - i.e. by building a system consistent with what is projected to be the true subject. This in effect collapses the innerlouter distinction, and hence any opportunity for doubting the coherence and tranparence of that subject. The aesthetic papers are al1 written in the first person. They appear to be confessional. Unlike those of the early church fathers, the aesthete's confessions are not mediated by God. They are more like Abelard's confessions in revealing even socially shocking things about the individual. But they are unlike Abelard's confessions in that they do not directly revealfacts about the individual. Rather, thev reveal vaiues, attitudes, and psychological perspectives. But they do more than this. The voice of the aesthete does not appear in monologue, as the only basis for constructing a picture of the aesthete. It is embedded within the editorial voice of Eremita, it is contrasted with the voice of Judge William (the ethicist of Volume 2), and even has other voices embedded within it (e.g. the voices of Johannes the seducer and his victim Cordelia). It is this nesting of narrative voices within EithevlOr which allows it to make a distinctive break as a technology of the self. Such a multiplication of narrative voices within a literary text was not new. In fact it was in vogue in the arabesque novel, characterized by Friedrich Schlegel as having fragmen- Wriring as a technology of the self in Kierkegaard and Foucault Enrahonar 25, 1996 61 tary form and a mixture of genres*. Eitber/Or is subtitled <<A Fragment of Lifen. Its mixture of literary genres includes aphorisms, essays, letters, diaries, even a sermon. The arabesque novel was also frequently elided with the Bil!ngsroman, or novel of self-cultivation, where the protagonist's consciousness evolves with the narrative point of view. But Kierkegaard made new use of these conventions. Like Plato, he took issue with a prevailing use of writing as a technology of the self. Kierkegaard's tactic was to redouble the technology in parody, then to bracket the aesthetic practice of self-writing in such a way as to expose its limitations. The parodic transgression of the limits of aesthetic self-writing, however, does not abolish the aesthete's strategies aitogether. Rather, the aesthetic is aufgeboben (sublared) i.e. negated by being preserved in a higher sphere. In Kierkegaard's case, the aesthetic is to be sublated by being preserved as a transfiguring vision of reality, but operating within the context of an ethico-religious life. Kierkegaard's tactic is to write the aesthetic point of view as if from the inside. Once the aesthetic self has been objectified in material artefacts, then the author can step back from it and appraise it. This is precisely how the slave manages to reverse the masterlslave dialectic in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit in the quest for selfrecognition. As a technology of the self, writing is here an objectification of oneself in the world which allows one to see oneself as if from the outside. The inner becomes outer - but in Kierkegaard's case, this is to allow one to become truly inner. The first volume of EitberlOr gives us a portrayal of aesthetic self-cons- truction in the uses the aesthete, A, makes of his own writing. But the distance afforded by the multiplicity of narrative voices allows us as readers, and Kierkegaard as a writer, to make an existential evaluation of the aesthetic life. II. Romantic Irony What are the characteristics of writing as a technology of the self for the aesthete - as presented in Eitber/OrVolume l? Since the aesthete is modelled on the German romantic ironist, we can expect a high degree of overlap in their uses of writing. As we shall see, Kierkegaard's critique of romantic irony also applies to the aesthete. Writing for the aesthete is a space for spontaneous self-expression and play. This expression is governed by the mood of the moment -at least when writing aphorisms. No regard is paid to consistency or to an overail telos. Eremita even thinks the order of the aesthete's papers is arbitrarythey follow no apparent narrative plan. While the aesthete has no overall telos, he does pursue limited goals. One of the main motivations for aesthetic action is to escape boredom. The aesthete 8. Friedrich Schlegel, aLetter Abour the Novel), in Dialogue on Poety and Literary Aphorisms, rranslared by Ernsr Behler and Rornan Struc, Pennsylvania State Universiry Press, 1968: 94-105. 62 Enrahonar 25, 1996 William McDonald uses a combination of imagination and accident to ((poeticize)) the mundane. Irony, caprice, and reversal are tactics used to transfigure the actual world to render it interesting. For example, A says he knew a man ((whose chatter certain circurnstances made it necessary for me to listen to. At every opportunity he was ready with a little philosophical lecture, a very tiresome harangue. Almost in des~air, 1 suddenly discovered that he perspired copiously when talking. 1 saw the pearls of sweat gather on his brow, unite to form a stream, glide down his nose in a drop-shaped body. From the moment of making this discovery, al1 was changed. 1 even took pleasure in inciting him to begin his philosophical instruction, merely to observe the perspiration on his brow and at the end of his nose» (EO, 1: 295). Similar transfigurations through injections of arbitrariness can be achieved by seeing the middle of a play, or by reading the third part of a book. Another tactic for escaping boredom, for the aesthete, is the ((rotation method~. This amounts to the prudential management of one's moods and desires, in a libidinal economy. This requires a certain degree of self-knowledge, so that one can predict when a desire will be satiated, when a particular mood needs to lie fallow, what succession of psychological states would be most titi- Ilating. Aesthetic transfiguration of experience to escape boredom corresponds to the romantic ironist's aspiration to invest the mundane with infinite significance. This requires selective memory and forgetfulness. But this is not the same as the use of hypomnemata as a mnemonic aid. Memory and forgetfulness are conceived as Nietzsche later conceived them not as the brute presence or absence of sense impressions of the facts, but as the principles which organize our observations, and which preselect what we notice and overlook. In short, memory and forgetfulness are our principles of interpretation. It is by means of memory and forgetfulness that the aesthete poeticizes actuality. Because the primary negative motivation for the aesthete is to escape boredom, the interesting is the primary positive motivation. The aesthete is a sensualist in the realm of reflection. While he adores im-mediate, i.e. unmediated, experience, he cannot attain it directly himself. Instead he has to enjoy im-mediate experience vicariously, or transfigured by his own poetic activity. In his unpublished work De Omnibus Dubitandum Est, Kierkegaard (or his pseudonym Johannes Climacus) points out that etymologically the word ((interest» breaks down into the Latin ccinter)) (benveen) and «esse» (being). Interest is therefore a being-benveen. Aesthetes and ironists throughout Kierkegaard's oeuvre are fascinated by young wornen. These are metaphors of immediacyexperiential virgins, unviolated by reflection. They are spontaneous, naive, and pure. Language is glossed frequently in Kierkegaard's work as that which mediates benveen world and consciousness. The greater the linguistic reflectiveness, the greater the degree of mediation. The aesthete uses language to get benve- en (inter) the being (esse) of the immediate. Language is the interesting. By prising apart the im-mediately given with language, the aesthete transfigures it. Wriring as a cechnology of the self in Kierkegaard and Foucault Enrahonar 25, 1996 63 A metaphor for the investment of the im-mediate with inter-est is tautology. The aesthete devote one of the diapsalmata to the topic: c(Tauto1ogy is and remains still the supreme principle, the highest law of thought. What wonder then that most men use it? Nor is it so entirely empty that ir rnay well serve to fdl out an entire life)) (E O, 1: 37). That is, a tautology seerns to be saying nothing at all, but just the repetition in language of the subject by the predicate is a rnediation. It is an analogue of fictional language. Its meaning does not derive from reference to the actual world, but is produced by the interplay of signs within a language. It is just this insertion of language into the self through the technology of writing, in an effort to invest irn-mediately given experience with interest, that constitutes aesthetic self-creation. But this act of getting between experience to expand it into something inter-esting requires a starting point. That is why the aesthete needs an occasion. The spontaneous jottings in a diary, such as those found in the diapsalmata, can provide occasions for aesthetic expansion. A young woman, too, can be an occasion for the differential work of language (an idea explored at length in ccDiary of the Seducen). The aesthete conceives of language and consciousness as systems of dzf férance9, 11 is only in naive, spontaneous im-mediacy that consciousness is present to its object. When language or reflection intervene, there is a deferral and displacement of both the subject and the object. There is only the interplay of signs. The subject is no longer transparent and self-pre- sent, but lost in a labyrinth of ccunlirnited semiosis)). For the romantic ironists, this is infinitely interesting; for Kierkegaard, this is a condition of despair. Kierkegaard had already criticized romantic irony as theorized and practised in the work of Fichte, Friedrich Schlegel, Tieck and Solger in The Concept oflrony. The main thrust of the critique is that romantic irony loses touch with actuality. It turns everything into a poetic drearn. For example, in Tieck, ((Anirnals talk like human beings, human beings talk like asses, chairs and tables becorne conscious of their meaning in existence, human beings find existence meaningless. Nothing becornes everything, and everything becomes nothing; everything is possible, even the impossible; everything is probable, even the improbable)) (Cl, 3 18). The rnain characteristic of this forrn of aestheticism is that it transfigures actuality, but in such a way that it loses touch with actuality. Kierkegaard wants to retain the transfiguration of everyday life by means of an inward infinity, but he wants to reject the extreme subjective idealism of romantic irony. 9. Cf. Jacques Derrida, xDifferanceb, in Speech and Phenomena And Other Essays on Hztsserl? Theory of Signs, translated by David B. Allison, Northwestern University Press, 1973: 129-160.