nese universities and, as a frequent visitor to China, was en-
thusiastic about the popularity of deconstruction there.)
For What Tomorrow,though rather miscellaneous in form,
is useful for the evidence it provides of the intense degree of
adulation directed toward Derrida near the end of his life. He
had become, in some quarters, a truly prophetic figure, uniquely
qualified to pronounce on the moral and political questions of
his era. In her preface to For What Tomorrow,Roudinesco re-
counts her decision to interview Derrida, despite the danger, as
she describes it, of being struck mute by his eloquence: “His
gifts as a speaker, the power of his arguments, his boldness re-
garding certain problems of our times—as well as the practi-
cal wisdom acquired from countless lectures given in every
part of the world—threatened to take my voice away” (ix).
Roudinesco recovers her voice. She begins by comparing
Derrida to Zola, calling him “the incarnation of the Revolu-
tion” ( 9 ) and informing him, “In short, I am inclined to say
you have triumphed” ( 2 ). She then makes herself heard on the
subject of the United States, a familiar piñata for French theo-
rists. “Every time I go there I feel a terrible violence,” she
shudders ( 29 ). Why, one wonders? Guns, drugs, racism, capi-
tal punishment? No, actually, it’s... smoking bans. (Derrida
mildly responds that anti-smoking laws have also been passed
in France.)
Roudinesco goes on to the subject of sex on campus and
what Derrida calls the “microclimate of terror” that surrounds
it in the United States. “Sometimes,” Derrida remarks, a pro-
fessor “risks being accused because he smiled, gave a female
student a ‘compliment,’ invited her to have coffee, etc.” Refer-
ring to “what everyone agrees to call ‘rape,’” Derrida notes that
“the most widely shared passion never excludes some kind of
asymmetry from which the scene of rape is never completely
234 Politics, Marx, Judaism