A Note on Bataille’s Conception of the Sun

06/15/2021

It is commonly said that Bataille’s conception of the Sun is ridiculous or scientifically untenable, etc. But this attempt at a critique misses the whole point. In Reading Bataille Now, Pierre Lamarche responds to this common attempt at a critique by emphasizing Bataille’s emphasis on myth.

Lamarche lines out the common attempt at a critique as follows: “It has been argued, of course, that the alleged inexhaustibility of the supply of solar energy to the planet is, in fact, a myth, and that Bataille’s general economy is, in fact, limited” [emphasis mine].[1] The issue with this failure of a critique is that “one of Bataille’s goals was to resuscitate myth”.[2] Lamarche furthers with the fact that “[t]he target of Bataille’s myth of general economy — the sad tale of that original sin which we call scarcity — is itself a myth”.[3]. For Lamarche, “Bataille employs a reasonably plausible — and, within the context of his theory of general economy, innocuous — myth in order to disarm an utterly implausible one that has done an unspeakable amount of harm”.[4]

Bibliography

Lamarche, Pierre. “The Use Value of G. A. M. V. Bataille.” Essay. In Reading Bataille Now, edited by Shannon Winnubst, 54–72. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007.

References

[1]: Pierre Lamarche, “The Use Value of G. A. M. V. Bataille,” in Reading Bataille Now, ed. Shannon Winnubst (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007), pp. 54–72, 70–71.

[2]: Ibid., 71.

[3]: Ibid.

[4]: Ibid.