Critical Essays

FIRST EDITION, of which no large paper copies were printed. Review copy enriched with a dedication from Roland Barthes to Pierre and Denise Klossowski. Butor places Barthes' estrangement from his old friends at the time of his entry into the Tel Quel group "he was, one might say, captured by the Tel Quel group, who mounted a jealous guard around him"(interviews of Michel Butor with Anne Clerc). An estrangement that did not prevent Roland Barthes from thinking of the Klossowski couple, of his friend Pierre, the great writer, one of the greatest if we believe Michel Foucault:

"To Pierre and Denise,from their old friendRoland"

After works such as Mythologies or On Racine, this work brings together the essential part of Barthes' critical apparatus, of his reflection on literature and theatre, but it is "neither a prize list, nor a gallery of examples."