538 Jacques Derrida 1984–2004
‘He’d changed since Coimbra,’ acknowledges Nascimento, ‘but he
still seemed in good shape. He was quite calm when he talked about
his illness, and although I suggested several times that he rest in his
hotel in Copacabana, he insisted on attending all the sessions in
those three long days. He followed the simultaneous translation on
headphones and intervened in the debates.’^48
The conference was held in Rio in the auditorium of the Maison
de France. People came from all over Brazil and other countries,
especially the United States, and there simply was not enough
room for everyone. It was in front of a huge, enthusiastic audience
that, on 16 August 2004, Derrida gave the opening address, his last
lecture, at his last conference: ‘Pardon, reconciliation, truth: what
genre?’ He spoke for three full hours, superbly. ‘Coming to Brazil
was for him an affi rmation of life,’ says Evando Nascimento. ‘Those
who didn’t know he was ill didn’t realize, as he didn’t show any sign
of weakness. As he fi nished his lecture, he said with a smile: “There
are many more things to be said, but I wouldn’t want to tire you.” ’
Bernard Stiegler was chosen to give the fi nal address. If he had
taken the trouble to travel all this way, it was mainly to see, for one
last time, the man who had played such an important role in his
career. ‘On arriving in the lecture hall,’ he relates, ‘I didn’t recognize
him at fi rst. He had aged, was thinner, and seemed to have diffi culty
expressing himself. But right from the start of the lecture, he turned
back into his old self. Politically, he had become much more radical;
this is one of the things that most struck me.’ Stiegler remembers
a lunch at the French Embassy where Derrida, very indignant at
Bush, defended Fidel Castro. ‘On the last day of the conference,’
he continues, ‘just after my lecture, we had one of the few real argu-
ments in our lives, the fi rst since my thesis defence. He put up a real
fi ght, wouldn’t let go, but he did listen to my arguments. Perhaps the
only real discussion in his view had to be public.’^49
Jacques phoned Marguerite twice a day. He said he was very glad
to be travelling and was feeling better. However, his timetable was
as full as ever: he held a press conference, gave interviews to the
television channel Globo, and to the Folha de São Paulo, and even
agreed to an autograph session.
On his return from Brazil, he was handed the copy of Le Monde
where his long interview with Jean Birnbaum had been published
on 19 August, with the title ‘I am at war with myself’. He seemed
both pleased and upset: ‘It’s like an obituary,’ he sighed. He was
particularly bothered by the photo, which was big enough to bring
out his illness. He said to Élisabeth Roudinesco: ‘It’s not enough for
them to know that I’m ill, it’s not enough for me to say it [.. .], they
want to see the trace of illness on my face and they want the reader
to see it.’^50