The Time of Dialogue 2000–2002 497
But Nancy was mainly just moved by this homage. He gauged its
value in terms both of friendship and of the extraordinary attention
to his work that the book revealed.
It was a coup... I was thunderstruck to see the title, then the
book itself. I think I then said to Jacques: I was speechless, it
was too much. Of course, in matters of friendship there is no
‘too much’, and in this respect I was deeply moved. But there is
in his analysis such a force of knowledge and problematization
that I said to myself: I’m never going to be able to touch touch
again [je ne dois plus toucher au toucher]. What you need to
realize is that I’d never thematized touch as such, or hardly. In
breathtaking fashion, Jacques had managed to read a number
of texts in which this motif appeared from the sidelines. He had
even tracked down the metaphorical uses of the word ‘touch’.
And he brought this extremely attentive reading into the huge
set of other texts that he had read or reread to compose what
was in every sense his book, his own book, on touch. Also, I’d
clearly perceived the way he showed me the trap I’d only just
avoided – let’s call it ‘haptocentrism’, as he puts it. If I had
avoided it, it was because I hadn’t thematized it, and not out
of any theoretical vigilance. And he also teaches me something
of a lesson in this book. As you must know, it contains this
phrase: ‘I tell myself, in my heart of hearts [à part moi], Jean-
Luc Nancy is the greatest philosopher of touch.’ Jacques must
have laughed over his amphibological trouvaille: ‘I tell myself,
in my heart of hearts [à part moi]’ and ‘I tell myself that, apart
from me [à part moi] – who am in fact the greatest.’ Finally,
what I take away from this book is also the end: ‘Just salut,
greeting without salvation: just a salut on the way.’ The word
‘salut’* becomes a concept in the form of an interjection of
greeting or farewell: it’s admirable, I often think of it.^5In the spring, Élisabeth Roudinesco and Jacques Derrida embarked
on a book of dialogues that would take the title For What
Tomorrow... The idea had been launched during a dinner, by
Olivier Bétourné, the partner of Élisabeth Roudinesco, the then
vice-president and manager of the publishing house Fayard. Struck
by the way they were forever discussing current aff airs, and ethical
and political questions, he said he was convinced that such a work
would be of the greatest interest and would attract new readers to
Derrida.
- ‘Salvation’, but also ‘hi!’ or ‘bye!’ – Tr,