Bark

— —

Georges Didi-Huberman (Directeur d'études, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales) Samuel E. Martin (Lecturer, French Studies, University of Pennsylvania)

Bark

Georges Didi-Huberman (Directeur d'études, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales), Samuel E. Martin (Lecturer, French Studies, University of Pennsylvania)

$32.99

Hardback

Not in-store but you can order this
How long will it take?

Availability Information

We source books from suppliers in Australia and overseas. For books we don't currently have in stock, the time it takes to get them from our suppliers can vary widely - from a few days to a few months - so we check each book with each supplier to determine the expected time it will take to be supplied to us.

We then advise you accordingly. If the time taken to get any book is too long for you, you can let us know and we will cancel or adjust your order, and refund as required.

To find out the anticipated arrival time for specific items prior to ordering, please contact us by phone or email:

Phone +61 2 9264 3111, or 1800 4 BOOKS (1800 4 26657) if outside Sydney:
option 1 Abbey's Bookshop (Crime, History, Science, Kids & more) • info@abbeys.com.au
option 2 Language Book Centre (ESL & Foreign Languages) • language@abbeys.com.au
option 3 Galaxy Bookshop (Sci-fi, Fantasy, Romance, Graphic Novels) • sf@galaxybooks.com.au

QTY:

English

MIT Press
20 October 2017

Memoirs; European history; Social & cultural history; The Holocaust

Series: The MIT Press

A noted French thinker's poignant reflections, in words and photographs, on his visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

On a visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau, Georges Didi-Huberman tears three pieces of bark from birch trees on the edge of the site. Looking at these pieces after his return home, he sees them as letters, a flood, a path, time, memory, flesh. The bark serves as a springboard to Didi-Huberman's meditations on his visit, recorded in this spare, poetic, and powerful book. Bark is a personal account, drawing not on the theoretical apparatus of scholarship but on Didi-Huberman's own history, memory, and knowledge.

The text proceeds as a series of reflections, accompanied by Didi-Huberman's photographs of the visit. The photographs are not meant to be art-Didi-Huberman confesses that he ""photographed practically everything without looking""-but approach it nevertheless. Didi-Huberman tells us that his grandparents died at Auschwitz, but his account is more universal than biographical. As he walks from place to place, he observes that in German birches are birken; Birkenau designates the meadow where the birches grow. Didi-Huberman sees and photographs the ""reconstructed"" execution wall; the floors of the crematorium, forgotten witnesses to killing; and the birch trees, lovely but also resembling prison bars. Taking his own photographs, he thinks of the famous photographs taken in 1944 by a member of the Sonderkommando, the only photographic documentation of the camp before the Germans destroyed it, hoping to hide the evidence of their crimes. Didi-Huberman notices a ""bizarre proliferation of white flowers on the exact spot of the cremation pits."" The dead are not departed.

By: Georges Didi-Huberman (Directeur d'études Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales)
Translated by: Samuel E. Martin (Lecturer French Studies University of Pennsylvania)
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 178mm, Width: 127mm, Spine: 16mm
ISBN: 9780262036849
ISBN 10: 0262036843
Series: The MIT Press
Pages: 136
Publication Date: 20 October 2017
Recommended Age: From 18
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Georges Didi-Huberman, a philosopher and art historian based in Paris, teaches at the cole des Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales. Recipient of the 2015 Adorno Prize, he is the author of more than fifty books on the history and theory of images, including Invention of Hysteria- Charcot and the Photographic Iconography of the Salpatri re (MIT Press), Bark (MIT Press), Images in Spite of All- Four Photographs from Auschwitz, and The Surviving Image- Phantoms of Time and Time of Phantoms- Aby Warburg's History of Art. Samuel E. Martin teaches French at the University of Pennsylvania

Reviews for Bark

Bark is a slim, poignant, controlled narrative, yet is presented as an irrepressible and unpremeditated stream of writing. —Guylaine Massoutre, Le Devoir Bark is the exploration of a gaze, and the exploration, through looking, of what is looked at. What is looked at are photographs, as well as a place: Auschwitz-Birkenau. —Jean-Philippe Cazier, Mediapart

Winner of <PrizeName>Bark was named a winner of the 2018 French-American Foundation Translation Prize</PrizeName> 2018
Winner of <PrizeName>Longlisted for the 2018 PEN Translation Prize</PrizeName> 2018
Winner of Bark was named a winner of the 2018 French-American Foundation Translation Prize 2018
Winner of Bark was named a winner of the 2018 French-American Foundation Translation Prize</PrizeName> 2018
Winner of Longlisted for the 2018 PEN Translation Prize 2018