Abstract

This article considers and develops Jacques Derrida’s ideas on friendship. According to him, friendship between two people is haunted by the knowledge that both will die, and that one will probably witness the death of the other. Due to this knowledge, friendship is structured by a sense of mourning, both before and after the friend’s death. I read this idea in the context of Nathacha Appanah’s novel, Le dernier frère (2007). In it, she recounts a story of two boys, Raj and David, who meet in Mauritius during the Second World War period. More exactly, they become friends in precarious conditions, such that one is constantly aware of the other’s mortality. I argue that, because of this constant awareness, their friendship is haunted by a conscious form of mourning: explicit, intense, and continuous, both in life and in death. I call this affect precarious mourning, which constitutes friendships formed in precarity.

摘要

本文考虑并发展了雅克·德里达 (Jacques Derrida) 的友谊思想。根据他的说法，两个人之间的友谊都被他们都会死的知识所困扰，而且一个人可能会目睹另一个人的死亡。由于这种认识，友谊是由一种哀悼感构成的，无论是在朋友死前还是死后。我是在 Nathacha Appanah 的小说Le dernier frère的背景下读到这个想法的(2007)。在其中，她讲述了两个男孩 Raj 和 David 的故事，他们在第二次世界大战期间在毛里求斯相遇。更确切地说，他们在不稳定的情况下成为朋友，以至于一个人不断意识到另一个人的死亡。我认为，由于这种持续的意识，他们的友谊被一种有意识的哀悼形式所困扰：无论是生是死，都是明确的、强烈的和持续的。我把这种情绪称为风雨飘摇的哀悼，它构成了风雨飘摇中结成的友谊。