Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0080425798 ISBN 13: 9780080425795

Publisher: Pergamon, 1998

Saussure's Cours de linguistique générale has been one of the seminal books of the twentieth century, having shaped modern linguistics and semiology, and having importantly affected anthropology, philosophy and literary studies. Yet the book was written by Saussure's colleagues, based on student notes taken during the three occasions when Sausssure gave his lectures on general linguistics. Until now, those notes themselves have been unavailable, except in fragmented and incomplete form in Engler's unwieldy and hard-to-find edition of the Cours. This volume presents Riedlinger's notes on the second course of lectures in the sequence in which they were written. The notes are accompanied by an introduction and a full English translation of the text. This edition also contains an appendix with the notes of Charles Patois. Patois' notes have never before been published, and make this book unique.

Together with the notes to the first and third volumes, this work provides the most reliable source material for Saussure's thought. It will be welcomed by linguistic theorists, historians of linguistics, philosophers, and students.

Language Notes:

Text: French, English (translation)
Original Language: French

Review:

Professor Hans Aarsleff, Princeton University
The editors have done a very great service to scholarship. In the past, material relating to the Cours was scattered and inaccessible. These volumes constitute incomparably better access to Saussure's thought than we have previously had either in the 1916 text and its versions in other languages, or in Engler's edition.

François Chevillet
...The notes of Patois, used for the first time, sometimes shed a different light on the Master's thinking and will not fail to arouse the curiosity of linguist historians who will welcome this new information source with enthusiasm. ...Komatsu's editorial work is excellent. ...The French text is on the left of the page and George Wolf's English translation on the right. The latter, revised by Gabriel Bergougnioux, is generally clear and often quite literal, reflecting a constant worry to avoid over interpretation and deviation from the original.
Etudes Anglaises
Neile A. Kirk
... a fine contribution to linguistic history.
History of Language