Comments on: Archive fever (a dusty digression)

By: Mike Arnzen

Mike Arnzen — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:22:11 +0000

GREAT post…I hadn’t read DUST but I now fully intend to. “Archive Fever” is awesome. To get a sampler of the best of Derrida’s idea from that book, I highly recommend the documentary, DERRIDA, by Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering Kofman (Zeitgeist Films, 2002). AF is cited often in the film and you get to hear Derrida talk about it for himself (and it’s just generally a great way to get to know his work… there are scenes of him just making toast and drinking orange juice in his robe for crying out loud).

By: Cath Feely

Cath Feely — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 12:57:16 +0000

I love _Dust_ – particularly the section you quoted from. Carolyn is such a wonderful writer. Have you read _Landscape for a Good Woman_? I cannot think of a better opening for a work of history (though it’s hard to categorise such an amazing piece of work) than this from the first two pages about her mother’s death:

‘She died like this. I didn’t witness it. My niece told me this…

Like this: she flung up her left arm over her head, pulled her knees up, looked out with an extraordinary surprise. She lived alone, she died alone: a working-class life, a working-class death.’

An amusing Steedman (and dust!) anecdote that my supervisor told me: she came to stay at his house for a few days last year. The first thing his six-year-old daughter said to her as she walked through the door was ‘Oh Carolyn! You’re staying in the bedroom that Mummy never hoovers!’ Fantastic.

By: Sharon

Sharon — Sat, 18 Jun 2005 07:40:48 +0000

I have a particular gripe about places that use (cheap) chairs with high arm rests so that you can’t pull the chair up anywhere near the desk – as if we needed any encouragement to hunch over our documents. And old-fashioned wooden chairs with slatted backs (which the printed books room at NLW has. Ow ow ow). Come to think of it, I do seem to recall that the BL chairs are supremely nasty…

By: Natalie Bennett

Natalie Bennett — Sat, 18 Jun 2005 00:31:50 +0000

Thanks for the recommendations – there’s some great reflexive reading in there.

And on the chairs- why, oh why, since by the time they designed the place there was plenty of knowledge about ergonomics, are the chairs in the British Library so uncomfortable and designed to give you backache?!

By: Plume

Plume — Thu, 16 Jun 2005 22:20:50 +0000

This brings back memories of a seedy hotel near the harbor of Lorient – I must admit I skipped my morning shower in this one… I nonetheless commend the Service historique de la marine of Lorient as an extremely pleasant place for archivistic research.

By: Sharon

Sharon — Thu, 16 Jun 2005 17:57:08 +0000

Thanks. I’ll check out that article. In fact, it’s reminded me that I have a bunch of stuff from JBS that I want to read, which is piling up because I can’t get off-campus online access (unless I can work out how to make RAS/VPN work with my broadband connection… as usual, UWA information services helpsheets seem to be several years behind the technology) and I always forget to look at them when I’m actually in my office/the library.

By: rob

rob — Thu, 16 Jun 2005 11:44:13 +0000

Love this post, Sharon (especially as another member of The Dust Club -- has anybody read that book and not been profoundly effected?). Have you read Steedman's recent article on 'Servants and their relationship to the unconscious'? It's fantastic. Should you want to, you can actually read Archive Fever online via JSTOR (at least, its first publication in English in Diacritics, which is AFAIK identical to the book): here.

By: The Elfin Ethicist

The Elfin Ethicist — Wed, 15 Jun 2005 19:11:41 +0000

Lovely career for the allergic

Twitch….

By: sepoy

sepoy — Wed, 15 Jun 2005 14:57:52 +0000

excellent post, sharon. brings both memories and premonitions.
i am huge fan of Dust as well and that last quote has been taped to my door for a while.