Hlne Cixouss SemiFictions

Hélène Cixous, author of over forty works of fiction, was deemed by Derrida to be the greatest living writer in French in 1990. Consistent with this evaluation, her writing is renowned for its dense poetical texture and lyricism. At the same time, she has been described by one of Derrida's translators, Peggy Kamuf, as 'one of our age's greatest semi-theoreticians'. Connecting these views, Hanrahan argues for a consideration of her texts as 'semi-fictions'. She offers an in-depth reading of five different texts, addressing their idiomatic specificity and investigating how the textual fabric unfolds.