Tracing calculation [calque calcul] between Nicolas Abraham and Jacques Derrida

Abstract

Jacques Derrida's writings on memory, loss and haunting are well known, yet little work has been done on the influence on Derrida of Nicolas Abraham's early work on the same issues. The two were good friends, prior to Abraham's death in 1975, although they never collaborated directly. In this paper, I suggest that Derrida's later work on the gift of death in some ways responds to Abraham's contribution to his own work. I also propose that Glas from 1974 anticipates this debt by connecting some of its wordplay to key terms in Abraham's own unpublished writings.