Textual friendship

the long version

"This in-depth study of the essay as a form of literary and philosophical expression examines the links between essay writing and the concept of friendship over a long textual tradition running from Plato's Phaedrus through Montaigne's Essais to Derrida's Politiques de l'amitie. Kuisma Korhonen suggests that the search for "textual friendship" motivates essayists as diverse as Bacon, Saint-Evremond, Mme de Lambert, Emerson, and Derrida. Despite the boundary of text separating writer and reader, the essay invites friendship. Through its references to other writers it creates a hermeneutical circle of understanding that links readers and writers across boundaries of time and space."--Jacket.