Friday, March 30, 2007

Baudrillard est mort

‘“I don’t know how to ask this question, because it’s so multifaceted,” he said. “You’re Baudrillard, and you were able to fill a room. And what I want to know is: when someone dies, we read an obituary—like Derrida died last year, and is a great loss for all of us. What would you like to be said about you? In other words, who are you? I would like to know how old you are, if you’re married and if you have kids, and since you’ve spent a great deal of time writing a great many books, some of which I could not get through, is there something you want to say that can be summed up?”
“What I am, I don’t know,” Baudrillard said, with a Gallic twinkle in his eye. “I am the simulacrum of myself.”
The audience giggled.
“And how old are you?” the questioner persisted.
“Very young.”’

This passage – originally from MacFarquhar’s ‘Baudrillard on Tour’ (previously quoted here) – seems an apt obituary.

Others have been authored by Le Monde, The Times, and The Guardian (plus one by Baggini).

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

You beat me to it, you bastard, and I told you. I'll kill you!

MH said...

Oh no you won’t!

Like you’d risk being normalised into a carcerial being for my death.

Anonymous said...

Be careful Mr Hill, surely it's pathological to risk being normalised in such a way.

MH said...

Isn't it anonymous (qua Rowan) who should be careful, since he's the one that would be normalised by the mechanisms of surveillance and punishment that are deployed in prisons when he is incarcerated for my murder?

Samuel Douglas said...

Exactly, you can't trust a subject who would be willing to risk that.

MH said...

Now I understand. Rowan is pathological because he would risk being normalised by penal system ...

Samuel Douglas said...

Yes, it's the old "only a crazy person would want to commit a crime" theme.

MH said...

Turning to more serious matters, should we try to organise something later in the year? A series of posts or an on-line symposia?

Captain Kickarse said...

You don't get out of this that easily

Samuel Douglas said...

Apparently he has