Abstract:
Karel Schoeman’s novel, Die uur van die engel (The hour of the angel) (1995), seems
to invite a deconstructive reading as the impossibility to represent an event (understood in
Derridean terms as unpredictable and singular) in language is repeatedly demonstrated in
this novel (and also in many of his later novels). It is pointed out that although this kind of
Derridean reading of the novel makes sense, a careful reading also indicates that Schoeman
attempts to reach beyond the aporia. Drawing on Badiou’s thought on the event and on
Gumbrecht’s emphasis on “the production of presence”, I indicate how reading Schoeman’s
novel (in contrast to reading his historical works) becomes an event in itself. The article opens
up a “third way”, beyond the dominant paradigms of Deconstruction and Cultural studies,
namely to read literature as an event.
