The article thus thinks of Agamben’s notoriously pessimistic figure of the Homo-Sacer – the abandoned man – in a new light. This process, the article argues, involves the imagination, and as such is thought of with regard to political and poetic imagination. Following Barthes idea of an obscene and Agamben’s notions of profanation and exposure, the article argues that love should be thought of as an experience in passivity that happens in the encounter and touch of two separate singularities. The article opens with a critique of the discursive state of love today and its relation to politics and power. Some of the most notable figures in a lover’s mind are “adorable,” “waiting,” “festivity,” and “suicide.This article offers the literary and philosophical concept of “profane love”, following the juxtaposition of Giorgio Agamben’s concept of singular love and his political and poetic project of profanation, with the figurative and scattered notions of love found in Roland Barthes A Lover’s Discourse: Fragments. Each figure comes with a short definition that’s packed with emotion, wit, and deeper meaning. They range from feelings of excitement, adoration, and arousal to feelings of neglect, loss, and anxiety. A Lover’s Discourse is essentially a stream of Barthes’s consciousness, split up into organized and neat categories and compartments. He calls on the work of great philosophers and weaves in references to Plato, Freud, and Goethe’s Werther to establish an idea of love outside of his own theorizations. References are also crucial to the novel’s success, as the quotes and theories Barthes integrates from other sources validate his discourse. He writes, “there are no first figures, no last figures,” suggesting that every fragment is equally important and plays a different role in a lover’s mind. Barthes discusses how prioritization of emotions and experiences changes in every situation, due to external circumstances all relationships are different in their order, although the figures are typically all present. Order is vital to this novel because there is no order at all when it comes to love. A Lover’s Discourse is broken down into 80 fragments, or what Barthes calls “figures,” defined as “gestures of the lover at work.” He also highlights the importance of two other structural components: order and references. The simple compartmental structure is key to this novel, as broken down by Barthes in the introductory section. The piece is an image-repertoire it is an outpouring of realities that take control of one’s mind when one is deep in love. Instead, he refers to the lovers he mentions anonymously, by using names like “X.” Despite being rooted in Barthes’s personal experiences, the novel generally addresses the mind of any individual, whether they are falling head over heels or they’re lost in heartbreak. Barthes utilizes first-person narrative throughout the novel, making the piece autobiographical. By combining theory, linguistics, philosophy, literature, and experiences, Barthes’s novel explores the trials and tribulations of what being in love does to your mind. Translated from French for its publication in 1977, the whimsical piece has become a literary classic in a genre all of its own. Roland Barthes’s thought-provoking novel A Lover’s Discourse: Fragments is as romantic as the language it was written in.
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