What did cavell want of poe

In a lecture given at Stanford some years ago, Stanley Cavell added his name to the list of thinkers who have endeavoured to read Poe philosophically, an impressive list that already included Derrida, Lacan, and Barbara Johnson.1 Yet Cavell’s engagement with Poe does not amount to a ‘‘reading’’ in any straightforward, positivistic sense of the term. Focusing largely on one of Poe’s lesser known stories, ‘‘The Imp of the Perverse,’’2 he gives three ‘‘directions for reading’’ the story, followed by three questions which, Cavell says, the text invites.3 However, none of the questions meets with an apparent answer, nor are the suggestions he makes as ‘‘directions for reading’’ followed up. ‘‘What did Cavell want of Poe?’’ is, then, a genuine question. But it is also a citation. In a more recent piece, entitled ‘‘What Did Derrida Want of Austin?,’’ Cavell’s reading of Austin’s How To Do Things With Words contains an insight that, applied to ‘‘The Imp of the Perverse,’’ opens up new dimensions to his engagement with Poe.4

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• In Quest of the Ordinary

  Stanley Cavell•In Quest of the Ordinary•1988

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• Philosophical Papers

  J L Austin, John Austin et al.•Philosophical papers.•1979

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• Must We Mean What We Say?

  Open Access•Stanley Cavell•Must We Mean What We Say?•2002

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