French Literature Reviews - 2026

The Possibility of Justice
Philosophy, Anthropology and Ideas

Le Seuil invites us to rediscover, in new editions, two works by Jacques Derrida that made justice the central question of his oeuvre: Force de loi (1994) and Voyous (2003), accompanied by the text of the speech delivered by Derrida upon receiving the Adorno Prize on September 22, 2001, published under the title Fichus. These volumes allow us to fully gauge the enduring relevance of his sustained reflection on the right to justice, spanning from 1989 to the early 2000s, against the backdrop of the "War on Terror". As early as September 11, 2001, he foresaw the potential self-destruction of democracies along with the collapse of a certain Enlightenment legacy. Marie Goupy has written the preface to the volume, titled "Derrida, The Urgency of Justice".

Published concurrently is the text of the seminar delivered between 1975 and 1977 on "The Thing", followed by the 6th session of Given Time II. This work offers a meditation on the ineffable, the materiality of words, and the way writing brings the thing itself into being and makes it vanish. Bringing together Heidegger, Ponge, Blanchot, and Freud, Derrida demonstrates that literature does not simply describe the world, but rather exposes the impossibility of fully expressing it.

Meanwhile, PUF is reissuing Voice and Phenomenon: Introduction to the Problem of the Sign in Husserl's Phenomenology (1967) in the "Quadrige" series, featuring a preface by Catherine Malabou. Rigorously reexamining Husserl's theory of the inner voice as the seat of consciousness, Derrida shows that meaning is never actually immediately present to consciousness because it always relies on some form of mediation. The existence of pure presence is impossible, as the trace precedes the sign. Herein lie the early foundations of the concept of "différance".

The publication of these texts highlights a crucial dimension of twentieth-century philosophy, rooted in the traditions of phenomenology and deconstruction. The enduring inquiry into justice, language, and political sovereignty developed by Derrida engages directly with foundational texts in Western philosophy and literature. By examining figures such as Husserl, Heidegger, and Freud, his work navigates the complex relationships between the sign, the trace, and the conditions of meaning. Readers interested in contemporary continental philosophy and twentieth-century intellectual history may find these reissues relevant.

These volumes revisit key moments in the evolution of deconstruction, spanning from early epistemological critiques of presence to later political interventions regarding democracy and violence. The reflection on justice and the ineffable addresses enduring questions concerning ethics and the limits of representation in literature and philosophy. This sustained engagement with the legacy of the Enlightenment and modern political crisis remains a central point of discussion within contemporary philosophical debate.