Signs of the Times: Deconstruction and the Fall of Paul de Man

Deconstruction leaves few people neutral. Lehman examines the current academic uproar over this literary movement and the scandal arising from the revelations that the late de Man, one of its chief exponents, had collaborated with the Nazis, writing anti-Semitic articles during the German occupation of Belgium. He includes a translation of de Man’s 1941 essay, “The Jews in Contemporary Literature.” Lehman is especially interested in analyzing the often disingenuous defenses of de Man offered by the deconstructive establishment, and the deeper implications of these with regard to the state of intellectual life in the United States. While Lehman finds the implications of deconstruction disturbing, his treatment is lively and thorough.