more on the Meillassoux interview

I won’t post any more quotations from the Meillassoux interview here, but am happy to describe some of its key topics. It’s a crisp document of around 6,000 words, featuring the usual Meillassoux blend of force and modesty. Here are some of the things he talks about:

*the way in which he was intellectually influenced by his father, the anthropologist CLAUDE MEILLASSOUX

*the way in which he was intellectually influenced by his wife, GWENAËLLE AUBRY, who is quite prolific both as a novelist and as a specialist on ancient philosophy

*the exact manner in which he became acquainted with the writings and then the person of Alain Badiou (the story is different from what I had thought it to be)

*the key point of philosophical disagreement between him and Badiou (outlined by Badiou himself in a letter to Meillassoux, and the latter apparently agrees that this is the key point of divergence)

*some rather sharp and clarifying objections to several critical points raised in some of my questions

*how Hegel and Marx are his two great philosophical masters

*his great admiration for Bergson

*his surprising degree of admiration for phenomenology

*three authors who are hidden influences on his work (one 19th century German and two 20th century French)

*his role in his youth as co-founder of a Situationist journal

*the surprising number of unpublished manuscripts he has written, on a lively variety of themes