Jacques Derrida, the man who gave us terms such as deconstruction and differance and is one of my favourite theorists, died last Friday. My life has pretty much been to eat sleep and smoke Derrida for the last while and it just seems he is flooding my existance. You know, one of those things I'm always talking about where all these little signs come together to let you know something is important?

I am being taught a course on deconstruction by a man who was one of the Yale disciples of the great man, I am meeting one of the great decontructionists (and the only one still alive) and spending all of the next two weeks with him pretty much, and one of my friends had Derrida as his supervisor when he was doing his PhD and so is quite upset about the whole thing.

Derrida is the only "serious" theorist who, in this short academic career of mine, encouraged me to continue to play with my text (always say this with a kinky look, it's just better) and who really made me giggle while I played with his. His emphasis on play just makes him one of the best readers ever and I'm not going to get all maudlin over his death, but as this is a blog to keep people informed about my thoughts, this man has been invading them for quite some time and despite the fact that his presence is, at times, uncomfortable, I welcome him into my mind with open arms.