KATIE CHENOWETH: My name is Katie Chenoweth,
and I am teaching a course called "Derrida's Library --
Deconstruction and the Book."
It's one of the very few philosopher's libraries
that has been kept intact.
CARLOS KONG: When I decided to come to Princeton,
I knew that Derrida's library was at Princeton.
So that was an archive that drew me here.
ANNA KIMMEL: Princeton University recently
acquired his library, and I think the opportunity
to be hands-on with that material is definitely
very enticing as a researcher, and to be
able to be one of the first people
not only to analyze his work since his passing in 2004,
but also to be one of the first people
to really view how he read.
KATIE CHENOWETH: Derrida used his books
as these kind of almost files.
So it's actually full of this other stuff.
And then there are books that are
just full of annotations and interesting marginalia.
JOHN LOGAN: We collect real things
because we want students to have real experiences of them.
That's why we buy annotated books, for example.
When you see a book that Derrida had in his hand,
and that he marked up, and that he
put paper clips into and post-its into,
you have a feeling that you're looking at a process happening.
You're part of a process that's happening.
And that, it seems to me, is extraordinarily exciting.
KATIE CHENOWETH: There were two main things
that I wanted the students to get out of this class.
One is that it's an introduction to Derrida and his thought,
and I didn't ask that the students have
any prior experience with Derrida before coming in.
So it's really a course in philosophy, in that sense.
And that's sort of half of what the course is.
And then the other half is really
an exploration of an archive, and what it
means to use archival materials, to really think
about archival materials in relation
to a philosopher's work.
ANNA KIMMEL: I'm really interested in how he perceives
writing as gestural, as an activity, as something
that's actively lived.
As a dancer, that attention to the now, to the presence,
is very important.
And that's something that I have brought to the table.
But at the same time, the class is filled with other students
who might speak German instead of French,
or who might have a presence in Greek language,
and can really offer a different nuance
to the readings of the text.
CARLOS KONG: That the books in it are real physical objects,
and they have a life of their own,
and you see Derrida just putting a bunch of different materials
in the books.
So there are amazing postcards and photographs
and notes, even pressed leaves, sometimes,
that I wouldn't expect to find in books.
KATIE CHENOWETH: So there was a decision
to treat this not as a collection of book, book, book,
book, book, but as something else, something where
each object had a relation to other objects,
both in terms of their location, in terms of their materiality.
So if you go into the library and you want to request a book,
you never get just one book.
You get an entire box.
And that box will often have books
by the same author, books that were
close to that one on the shelf.
And you'll have this whole kind of treasure trove
where you get to discover other things,
and not just the one thing that you
thought you wanted to look at.
ANNA KIMMEL: One day, Professor Chenoweth
brought in a typewriter to class.
It modeled one of the models that Derrida had.
And that was just a way for us to engage with our body,
to really be hands-on, in a very literal and physical way,
with the text, in the same way that Derrida,
when he was writing.
Especially now, since our generation
mainly types on the computer, that really
removed the physicality of writing from the process.
KATIE CHENOWETH: Well, you can't do two fingers.
Mm-mm.
It can't do two things, usually, right next to each other.
For me, probably the one thing I would
want students to take away from the course
would be a sense that thinking is not something
that happens abstractly.
Philosophy is not something that happens purely in the abstract,
purely in the mind, that it happens in relations to books
that you hold in your hand, and pencils and pens,
and marking and reading as this active, material,
technical process, and that you absolutely cannot separate
those two.
And I really hope that that in turn
encourages students to become more active thinkers
themselves, and to not think about philosophy as something
that happens up in the clouds, but as something that they're
engaging with and they're doing, even as they're
holding their books in their hands
and making their marks in their books.
JOHN LOGAN: It's probably the last library of its kind
that will come our way, because people simply don't collect
books like that anymore.
CARLOS KONG: With reading these texts, with also the library
in mind, it's incredible to see the way the idea of the library
is something that is animated throughout Derrida's
whole career and his whole thinking.
And you can read closely the ways in which he
is thinking consciously about, what will happen to my books
one day?
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