What do you think?
Rate this book
To Double Business Bound: Essays on Literature, Mimesis and Anthropology
An individual desires an object, not for itself, but because another individual also desires it. This mimetic desire, Rene Girard contends, lies at the source of all human disorder and order. In brilliant readings of Dante, Camus, Nietzsche, Dostoevski, Levi-Strauss, Freud, and others, Girard draws out the thesis of mimetic desire -- and ponders its suppression in the West since The historical mutilation of mimesis ...was no mere oversight, no fortuitous 'error.' Real awareness of mimetic desire threatens the flattering delusion we entertain not only about ourselves as individuals but also about the nature and origin of that collective self we call our society.
- GenresPhilosophyAnthropology
248 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1978
About the author
René Girard
119 books881 followersRené Girard was a French-born American historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science whose work belongs to the tradition of anthropological philosophy.
He was born in the southern French city of Avignon on Christmas day in 1923. Between 1943 and 1947, he studied in Paris at the École des Chartres, an institution for the training of archivists and historians, where he specialized in medieval history. In 1947 he went to Indiana University on a year’s fellowship and eventually made almost his entire career in the United States. He completed a PhD in history at Indiana University in 1950 but also began to teach literature, the field in which he would first make his reputation. He taught at Duke University and at Bryn Mawr before becoming a professor at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. In 1971 he went to the State University of New York at Buffalo for five years, returned to Johns Hopkins, and then finished his academic career at Stanford University where he taught between 1981 and his retirement in 1995.
Girard is the author of nearly thirty books, with his writings spanning many academic domains. Although the reception of his work is different in each of these areas, there is a growing body of secondary literature on his work and his influence on disciplines such as literary criticism, critical theory, anthropology, theology, psychology, mythology, sociology, economics, cultural studies, and philosophy.Girard’s fundamental ideas, which he has developed throughout his career and provide the foundation for his thinking, are that desire is mimetic (all of our desires are borrowed from other people), that all conflict originates in mimetic desire (mimetic rivalry), that the scapegoat mechanism is the origin of sacrifice and the foundation of human culture, and religion was necessary in human evolution to control the violence that can come from mimetic rivalry, and that the Bible reveals these ideas and denounces the scapegoat mechanism.
In 1990, friends and colleagues of Girard’s established the Colloquium on Violence and Religion to further research and discussion about the themes of Girard’s work. The Colloquium meets annually either in Europe or the United States.
René Girard died on November 4, 2015, at the age of 91 in Stanford.
He was born in the southern French city of Avignon on Christmas day in 1923. Between 1943 and 1947, he studied in Paris at the École des Chartres, an institution for the training of archivists and historians, where he specialized in medieval history. In 1947 he went to Indiana University on a year’s fellowship and eventually made almost his entire career in the United States. He completed a PhD in history at Indiana University in 1950 but also began to teach literature, the field in which he would first make his reputation. He taught at Duke University and at Bryn Mawr before becoming a professor at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. In 1971 he went to the State University of New York at Buffalo for five years, returned to Johns Hopkins, and then finished his academic career at Stanford University where he taught between 1981 and his retirement in 1995.
Girard is the author of nearly thirty books, with his writings spanning many academic domains. Although the reception of his work is different in each of these areas, there is a growing body of secondary literature on his work and his influence on disciplines such as literary criticism, critical theory, anthropology, theology, psychology, mythology, sociology, economics, cultural studies, and philosophy.Girard’s fundamental ideas, which he has developed throughout his career and provide the foundation for his thinking, are that desire is mimetic (all of our desires are borrowed from other people), that all conflict originates in mimetic desire (mimetic rivalry), that the scapegoat mechanism is the origin of sacrifice and the foundation of human culture, and religion was necessary in human evolution to control the violence that can come from mimetic rivalry, and that the Bible reveals these ideas and denounces the scapegoat mechanism.
In 1990, friends and colleagues of Girard’s established the Colloquium on Violence and Religion to further research and discussion about the themes of Girard’s work. The Colloquium meets annually either in Europe or the United States.
René Girard died on November 4, 2015, at the age of 91 in Stanford.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 31, 2022
Este libro es una colección de ensayos de René Girard que abarcan sus temas favoritos siguiendo la evolución de su pensamiento hasta aproximadamente mediados de los setenta. Los primeros ensayos aplican la teoría mimética a algunos de los grandes relatos de la literatura. Desfilan por aquí Dante, Proust, Dostoyevski y por supuesto Sófocles. Los siguientes están dedicados a la explicación del mito y lo ritual a partir de la hipótesis sacrificial, con una crítica directa al estructuralismo de Levy-Strauss, el psicoanálisis de Freud y el post estructuralismo de Deleuze y otros autores. Estos ensayos son difíciles incluso para quien conozca la obra de Girard, especialmente por la forma tan compleja que tienen los estructuralistas de expresarse, pero giran en torno a la incapacidad de estas corrientes de explicar sin fisuras el origen de los mitos y de los rituales sagrados. El libro termina con una entrevista de la revista Diacritics al autor, en la que recopila sus ideas y se defiende de algunas acusaciones.
En resumen, libro muy interesante pero complejo, no lo recomendaría para iniciarse en la obra de Girard, al menos no lo haría con los ensayos en contra del estructuralismo.
En resumen, libro muy interesante pero complejo, no lo recomendaría para iniciarse en la obra de Girard, al menos no lo haría con los ensayos en contra del estructuralismo.
August 25, 2020
Some outstanding articles here and an interview to round things off. Probably makes more sense read after Violence & the Sacred and/or Things Hidden... and probably requires more knowledge than I have of some of the works Girard is responding to and critiquing here, but still really rewarding. Particularly good content on Dostoevsky, plague, Shakespeare and critical theory - and the final article "Violence and Representation..." was particularly good. Thumbs up.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews