In Praise of Risk

by Anne Dufourmantelle

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Author: Anne Dufourmantelle

Publisher: Fordham University Press

Hardcover:
ISBN 10: 0823285456
ISBN 13: 978-0823285457

When Anne Dufourmantelle drowned in a heroic attempt to save two children caught in rough seas, obituaries around the world rarely failed to recall that she was the author of a book entitled In Praise of Risk, implying that her death confirmed the ancient adage that to philosophize is to learn how to die. Now available in English, this magnificent and already much-discussed book indeed offers a trenchant critique of the psychic work the modern world devotes to avoiding risk.

Yet this is not a book on how to die but on how to live. For Dufourmantelle, risk entails an encounter not with an external threat to life but with something hidden in life that conditions our approach to such ordinary risks as disobedience, passion, addiction, leaving family, and solitude

Keeping jargon to a minimum, Dufourmantelle weaves philosophical reflections together with clinical case histories. The everyday fears, traumas, and resistances that therapy addresses brush up against such broader concerns as terrorism, insurance, addiction, artistic creation, and political revolution. Taking up a project than joins the work of many French thinkers, such as Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida, Jean-Luc Nancy, Hélène Cixous, Giorgio Agamben, and Catherine Malabou, Dufourmantelle works to dislodge Western philosophy, psychoanalysis, ethics, and politics from the redemptive logic of sacrifice. She discovers the kernel of a future beyond annihilation where one might least expect to find it, hidden in the unconscious.

In an era defined by enhanced security measures, border walls, trigger warnings, and endless litigation, Dufourmantelle’s masterwork provides a much-needed celebration of the risks that define what it means to live.

Review

Magisterial. Dufourmantelle shows how life is universalized in risk and how recognizing this fact means enlisting in a fraternity among humans. (Antonio Negri)

This very rich book will have enormous appeal for readers interested in the intersection of philosophy, psychology, psychoanalysis, and humanistic inquiry. It productively challenges the assumptions of all these disciplines in novel ways and offers, in the final analysis, a redemptive path through that which matters to us most: living and dying well. Highly recommended. (Choice)

To live is to accept a certain degree of risk―the risk of hairline disappointments, of a too forceful will to believe, of brusque rejections that fatigue the soul, of being misunderstood yet again, of being undone without ever being saved. We could venture the idiom ‘life goes on’ with cynicism or despair, but we could also do so with the measure of desire. Anne Dufourmantelle’s beautiful book places us on the side of life and love, showing us the power of psychoanalytic reflection on those moments when we are asked to find the courage to risk ourselves on behalf of the other. (Jamieson Webster, author of Conversion Disorder)

From the Back Cover

“To live is to accept a certain degree of risk―the risk of hairline disappointments, of a too forceful will to believe, of brusque rejections that fatigue the soul, of being misunderstood yet again, of being undone without ever being saved. We could venture the idiom ‘life goes on’ either with cynicism and despair or with desire. Anne Dufourmantelle’s beautiful book places us on the side of life and love, showing us the power of psychoanalytic reflection on those moments when we are asked to find the courage to risk ourselves on behalf of the other.”―Jamieson Webster, author of Conversion Disorder

“Magisterial. Dufourmantelle shows how life is universalized in risk and how recognizing this fact means enlisting in a fraternity among humans.”―Antonio Negri

When Anne Dufourmantelle drowned in a heroic attempt to save two children caught in rough seas, obituaries around the world rarely failed to recall that she was the author of a book entitled In Praise of Risk, a trenchant critique of the psychic work the modern world devotes to avoiding risk.

Yet this is not a book on how to die but on how to live, since, for Dufourmantelle, risk entails an encounter not with an external threat to life but with something hidden in life. She therefore turns to clinical case histories that examine the ordinary fears, traumas, and resistances we face every day: personal experiences that brush up against such broader concerns as terrorism, insurance, addiction, artistic creation, and political revolution.

Working to dislodge Western philosophy, psychoanalysis, ethics, and politics from the redemptive logic of sacrifice, Dufourmantelle discovers the kernel of a future beyond annihilation where one might least expect to find it, hidden in the unconscious.

Anne Dufourmantelle, philosopher and psychoanalyst, taught at the European Graduate School. Her books in English include Power of Gentleness, Blind Date, and, with Jacques Derrida, Of Hospitality.

Steven Miller directs the Center for Psychoanalysis and Culture at the University at Buffalo, SUNY.

About the Author

Anne Dufourmantelle (Author)
Anne Dufourmantelle, philosopher and psychoanalyst, taught at the European Graduate School and wrote monthly columns for the Paris newspaper Libération. Her books in English include Power of Gentleness: Meditations on the Risk of Being; Blind Date: Sex and Philosophy; and, with Jacques Derrida, Of Hospitality.

Steven Miller (Translator)
Steven Miller is Associate Professor of English and Director of the Center for Psychoanalysis and Culture at the University at Buffalo, SUNY. He is author of War After Death: On Violence and Its Limits and translator of books by Jean- Luc Nancy, Catherine Malabou, and Étienne Balibar.

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In Praise of Risk