academic
For 7 years, Robert was a Prize Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford. He continues to work at the overlap between philosophy, psychoanalysis and literature.
Derrida and Autobiography (Cambridge University Press, 1995), examines Derrida’s innovative concept of the ‘autobiography of the writing’. Choice’s outstanding academic book of 1996.
Listen to Robert’s podcast on Derrida and forgiveness.
Award-winning journal Angelaki publishes cutting-edge research in the theoretical humanities.
Robert is a founding member, and sits on the Editorial Board of both the journal and the associated book series, Angelaki Humanities, published by Manchester University Press.
Death-Drive: Freudian Hauntings in Literature and Art comes out shortly with Edinburgh University Press, in its Frontiers of Theory series.
The book argues for a new theory of aesthetics based on Freud’s work on death.
‘This is a rich and fascinating work. Smith provides a lucid, probing and astute overview of the death drive in Freud, but also leads the reader into strange and compelling new terrain, exploring the notion that works of art have 'an unconscious of their own'. This is an important new contribution to a topic that remains controversial in psychoanalysis and culture more generally.’
Professor Nicholas Royle, University of Sussex
‘An extremely rigorous and well-written study.’
Professor Henry Sussman, Yale University
‘Superb - a book of generosity and rigour. An immense success.’
Jacques Derrida
‘Fine insights and astute readings of Derrida’s work.’
Professor Nicholas Royle, University of Sussex
‘Smith’s spirited, allusive and inventive survey of Jacques Derrida’s work moves with swift deliberation and focus through Derrida’s extensive oeuvre.’
Ned Lukacher, University of Illinois at Chicago
‘The death-drive has haunted psychoanalytic theory since its first appearance in Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle. Rowland Smith brings new life to this grim hypothesis, tracing the rhetorical adventures of the death-drive through Freud's works and those of his defenders and adversaries. Sinuously argued and vividly expressed, Death-Drive will appeal both to beginners and to seasoned readers of psychoanalysis and literature. Rarely has death been discussed with such vitality.’
Maud Ellmann, Donald and Marilyn Keough Professor of Irish Studies, University of Notre Dame
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