The Royal Remains – The People′s Two Bodies and the Endgames of Sovereignty - Hardcover

Santner, Eric

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0226735354 ISBN 13: 9780226735351

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2011

Synopsis

Rare Book

About this title

Review:

“Eric Santner’s "The Royal Remains" stands out, not only as the most important book on political philosophy of the last decade, but as a classic at the level of Walter Benjamin’s ‘Critique of Violence’ or Ernst Kantorowicz’s "The" "King’s Two Bodies". It prolongs their analyses into today’s world of micro-politics, raising the key question of what happens to the king’s "other" sublime body in a democratic society where the people—collectively—are the new sovereign. My reaction to reading this book is of wonder and awe; it is as if a new Benjamin (with the added features of Freud and Lacan) is walking among us.”—Slavoj Žižek
--Slavoj Zizek

"There is a truly remarkable persistence and consistency in Eric Santner's relentless endeavor which I have been passionately following over the years. From "My Own Private Germany" (1996) and "On the Psychotheology of Everyday Life" (2001) to "On Creaturely Life" (2006), there is a far-reaching and ever expanding pattern of reflection on the very conditions of the emergence of modernity, the ways in which it has been underpinned, in a multiplicity of ways, by a pound of 'spectral yet visceral' flesh. This research has reached its most lucid and complex form so far with "The Royal Remains", the vast politico-theological and psychoanalytic narrative about how the demise of transcendence has left us with a 'surplus of immanence', a bodily too-muchness, an errant fleshy excess that still defines our condition and haunts it. From Marat's death to Rilke's Malte, from Kafka's country doctor to Foucault's biopolitical body, there is an overarching and developing plot, masterly told by one of the great theoreticians of our era."

--Mladen Dolar

"This is a major book by one of the most original and skilled critic-thinkers of our time. "The Royal Remains"--the newest installment in Eric L. Santner's intellectual saga--charts the transition from personal to popular sovereignty, which is also the movement from the subject to the citizen. Santner is a master of the creative conjunction and here he generates dazzling readings that illuminate multiple texts and traditions of thinking. These same readings also lead directly and without apology to genuine insights into the ways we live, and fail to live, now--and how we might live better."

--Julia Reinhard Lupton, University of California, Irvine

"To read any work by Eric L. Santner is to enter a crowded, glorious, and alien world. A brilliant contribution to democratic and literary theory, political theology, secular studies, and aesthetics, "The Royal Remains" is a generous and humane book that is quite simply a must read."

--Bonnie H. Honig, Northwestern University

There is a truly remarkable persistence and consistency in Eric Santner s relentless endeavor which I have been passionately following over the years. From "My Own Private Germany" (1996) and "On the Psychotheology of Everyday Life" (2001) to "On Creaturely Life" (2006), there is a far-reaching and ever expanding pattern of reflection on the very conditions of the emergence of modernity, the ways in which it has been underpinned, in a multiplicity of ways, by a pound of spectral yet visceral flesh. This research has reached its most lucid and complex form so far with "The Royal Remains," the vast politico-theological and psychoanalytic narrative about how the demise of transcendence has left us with a surplus of immanence, a bodily too-muchness, an errant fleshy excess that still defines our condition and haunts it. From Marat s death to Rilke s Malte, from Kafka s country doctor to Foucault s biopolitical body, there is an overarching and developing plot, masterly told by one of the great theoreticians of our era.
--Mladen Dolar"

This is a major book by one of the most original and skilled critic-thinkers of our time. "The Royal Remains" the newest installment in Eric L. Santner s intellectual saga charts the transition from personal to popular sovereignty, which is also the movement from the subject to the citizen. Santner is a master of the creative conjunction and here he generates dazzling readings that illuminate multiple texts and traditions of thinking. These same readings also lead directly and without apology to genuine insights into the ways we live, and fail to live, now and how we might live better.
--Julia Reinhard Lupton, University of California, Irvine"

To read any work by Eric L. Santner is to enter a crowded, glorious, and alien world. A brilliant contribution to democratic and literary theory, political theology, secular studies, and aesthetics, "The Royal Remains" is a generous and humane book that is quite simply a must read.
--Bonnie H. Honig, Northwestern University"

About the Author:

Eric L. Santner is the Philip and Ida Romberg Professor in Modern Germanic Studies, professor of Germanic studies, and a member of the Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Chicago. He is the author of several books, most recently of On Creaturely Life: Rilke, Benjamin, Sebald, also published by the University of Chicago Press.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0226735354
• ISBN 13: 9780226735351
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 296