_Signs of the Times -- Deconstruction and the Fall of Paul de Man__ by David Lehman
As Lehman says, the ferocity of an academic debate is often inversely proportional to the actual material stakes.
I've noticed that this fight, amongst a few academics, seems rather nasty. The reviews of this book, and of another recent biography of de Man, seem polarized between 1 and 5 stars on Amazon.
On one side you have people calling Paul de Man a sociopath and a fascist.
On the other side, he was revered as a kind, quiet, hard-working teacher and a good listener -- and considered a visionary. His critics are tabloid journalists who understand nothing, supposedly.
The evidence is clear: He was certainly a scoundrel and an opportunist, and he wrote anti-Semitic articles for a Nazi-sponsored magazine in Belgium during the war, when he was in his early twenties. He embezzled money, lied, and lived as a sort of bigamist. He left his first family, it seems, partly because having an American wife would improve his immigration status.
However, every scoundrel who lacks any kind of integrity -- intellectual or moral -- is not a sociopath. A sociopath behaves consistently badly, and can't form attachments.
It seems, rather, that Paul de Man grew up, and suppressed his early adventures and alliances with the Nazis.
For balance, I've tried to read his essays on Nietzsche and Proust -- because I've read those two writers pretty thoroughly. I can't understand a single sentence, or even the general point, of de Man's essays.
It's hard for me -- being an amateur -- to tell what contributes most to the difficulty of his writing: Is he really saying such subtle things? Is it the French manner? Is it willful obscurantism? Sheer intimidation, or intellectual armor?
It seems that very little of substance is really being debated. One thing's for sure, his essays are no help at all if you want to understand Proust or Nietzsche better.
I notice, for instance, that de Man concentrates on one of Nietzsche's earliest -- and far from best -- books, _The Birth of Tragedy_.
The Lehman book is slightly annoying, because of some poetic license, some free association, but it's mostly pretty clear, and interesting.
One of my best friends, who attended Yale in the 80's, said he left Yale and the study of literature, because of the decadence and craziness at that time. (He objected to the study of de Sade and of comic books) I wonder if things have changed for the better, or not. Probably not.
