Derrida dead.

Jack Balkin has a tribute: "Although accused of undermining liberal and Enlightenment values he was actually deeply devoted to them."



UPDATE: I liked this quote, from the BBC report, taken from a film (could they name the film?) about Derrida:

At one point, wandering through Derrida's library, one of the filmmakers asks him: "Have you read all the books in here?"



"No," he replies impishly, "only four of them. But I read those very, very carefully."

That's a nice lesson about reading, comprehensible to anyone.



ANOTHER UPDATE: The NYT gives Derrida a long and very negative obituary, with plenty of attention to the Paul de Man scandal.