Conférences en Amérique, notes de cours et autres textes — Inédits II (1947–1949)

Author: Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961) Year: notes 1947–1949 (composition); 2022 (posthumous critical edition) Type: notes (manuscript notes for course, conferences, and reading-notes)

The second of two volumes of MP's previously-unpublished post-war manuscripts (Mimésis, 2022, ed. Michel Dalissier with Shôichi Matsuba). It assembles five major manuscript groups: (1) Les Problèmes de la Philosophie de l'histoire (PPH), course notes 1947–48, in three parts — Le rationalisme de Hegel, De Hegel à Marx, Autres textes; (2) Conférences à Mexico (Feb–March 1949) in three versions, the third being the synoptic "L'existentialisme français et ses problèmes"; (3) Conférences à New York (March 1949) — "Science and Philosophy" (English) + "La pensée politique et l'expérience du XXᵉ siècle"; (4) Autres conférences sur l'existentialisme (1949–50?) — "Marxisme et Existentialisme" + "La signification de l'existentialisme français"; (5) Autres inédits — Fragments (Le problème de la genèse, La genèse de la vérité, Le symbolisme secondaire du jeu, [Lecture de Montaigne]) + Dissertations (croyance, Bergson MM, Durkheim Règles VI, Plan d'agrégation, Plan Métaphysique du langage).

The volume is the chaînon manquant between MP's 1946 Brussels lecture and the 1954–55 Collège de France courses. Where Inédits I documented the 1946–47 Belgian/Scandinavian existentialism and Lyon liberty/Hegel-aesthetics work, Inédits II documents (i) MP's only sustained teaching specifically on Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of History, post-Kojève (the Introduction à la lecture de Hegel, achevé d'imprimer 28 April 1947, dates the course to 1947–48); (ii) MP's first systematic public exposition of his philosophy outside Europe (Mexico, six conferences); (iii) MP's first English-language statement of his philosophy of science (NY); (iv) the embryonic plan for La Prose du monde and RULL (the ENS Métaphysique du langage course, Nov 1948–Jan 1949).

Core Arguments

  1. Claim: PPH's opening identity: "La logique = phénoménologie formalisée — l'histoire = phénoménologie considérée dans sa réalisation extérieure" (p. 117). Hegel's procedure is pensée génétique: the logical movement and the movement of efficient causes coincide at the level of phenomena. Therefore the philosophy of history is not founded on a prior logic but rather delivers the concrete logic. Because: Hegel's actual intention is neither a priori deduction nor a posteriori induction; the phenomenological matrix of the Phenomenology of Spirit unifies what the Encyclopedia and Philosophy of History split. Une logique de fait voilà ce que va nous offrir Hegel. The history Hegel narrates is not a simple application of his logic, nor his logic drawn from history, but both at once. Against: any reading that polarizes Hegel's procedure into top-down or bottom-up; any reading that subordinates the philosophy of history to a prior systematic logic; the Encyclopedia-style logicization that the late-Hegel imposes. Location: PPH course opening, p. 117.

  2. Claim: MP's master/slave detour at the heart of the Greek world is justified because "Maître et Esclave [est le] processus par lequel un système fait apparaître en lui-même ce qui le contredit et le nie" (p. 128). The dialectic must be read as the ego/alter-ego problem with the Sartrean inflection of le regard: "Comment la présence d'autrui me dépasse, le regard — ou alors c'est moi qui le dépasse." But: "Ne pas partir de l'ego mais de l'interaction consciente." The dialectic moves through stoïcisme / scepticisme / conscience malheureuse to Christianity, where Trinity (Père / Fils / Esprit) gives the Incarnation as "gond de l'histoire universelle." Because: master and slave both fail — the master because the slave's recognition is unworthy, the slave because his work transforms the world. The Christian Trinity gives the dialectical structure: Judaism (Father, master-slave; Dieu maître); Incarnation (Son, "homme-Dieu"); Communauté/Église (Spirit, the unity). MP secularizes Hegel's religion-philosophy synthesis into State + History: "L'Incarnation n'est pas vraie sans l'Église ni l'Église sans l'État." Against: Kojève's totalization of master/slave as the entire content of history (MP's marginalia on his ENS copy: "Entre autres choses?" on Kojève p. 25); theological readings that fix the truth of religion at the level of religion itself. Location: PPH pp. 128–148.

  3. Claim: The terminal thesis of Part I: "Au fond: la pensée de Hegel n'est pas à ses yeux différente en substance de celle du croyant — Nous croyons tous, humanistes chrétiens ou non, à la même chose" (p. 144). And: "La vérité de la religion est l'état terminal de l'histoire humaine — La vérité absolue, c'est la totalité." MP's Hegel makes humanism and Christianity converge at the level of the Incarnation (the gond) but they part on the question of where this convergence is realized: in the State (Hegel, Germanic world) or in the proletariat (Marx). Because: religion gives the metaphysical structure but cannot complete itself; State and philosophy of right complete what Incarnation began. The 1948 N.D.L.R. on Trần Đức Thảo's recension of Kojève: "il faut en regarder en face l'énigme centrale, cette déhiscence qui ouvre à la nature et à l'histoire, mais qui a déjà son analogue à l'intérieur de la nature, et ne s'explique donc pas 'par en bas', mais pas davantage 'par en haut'." This is MP's earliest published use of "déhiscence" in connection with Hegel — anticipating V&I by 16 years. Against: theological readings that fix Hegel's truth at the level of religion alone; secular readings that reject religion's structural function. Location: PPH pp. 144–148; N.D.L.R. Temps Modernes September 1948.

  4. Claim: The "individu de classe" is the medium of history: "Au fond le lieu de l'histoire est une sorte d'on des relations humaines, qui n'est pas pour la conscience une fatalité, mais qui ne lui laisse le choix qu'entre un petit nombre d'attitudes... bref une logique des situations" (p. 184). The individu de classe replaces Durkheim's collective consciousness, Hegel's Weltgeist, and the Cartesian-individualist subject. "La grande trouvaille de Marx, c'était l'individu de classe, le On porté à la fois par conditions matérielles et par subjectivités, médium de l'histoire" (p. 186). The Capital is "une Phénoménologie de l'esprit concrète" (p. 178). Because: history requires a subject who is neither pure freedom (Sartre) nor pure object (orthodox marxism); the individu de classe is the structural mediation that makes both subject and object simultaneously visible. Logique de l'histoire is not necessity but Gestalten qui orientent le développement historique sans le nécessiter. Against: pure subjectivism (Sartre's "passé social toujours en sursis"); pure objectivism (Stalinist scientism); Durkheim's collective consciousness; Hegel's transcendent Weltgeist; Koestler's "fiction grammaticale" of the eliminated individual. Location: PPH pp. 180–186 (Idéologie allemande reading-notes).

  5. Claim: The 1949 conjuncture is a No man's land: "Au total 2 puissances principales: URSS qui ne représente pas socialisme, USA qui ne représente pas forme classique du capitalisme — ni forme libérale, ni forme impérialiste classique. Facteurs essentiels de l'histoire selon mise en perspective marxiste masqués ou déplacés par facteurs topographiques ou locaux" (NY Pensée politique p. 379). The new US economic Imperium (taxation-financed, Marshall Plan) is not classical impérialisme. L'expérience de l'Inconnu dans l'histoire du monde. The political response: "appuyer sur démocratie effective" + "attendre que l'incarnation redevienne possible." Because: the marxist axes (class struggle, world market, socialism-vs-capitalism) have been displaced by topographic/local factors (US-vs-USSR); national socialism (English Labour) and US Marshall-imperium dissolve class consciousness rather than radicalize it. The 1917–49 trajectory shows the changement de quantité en qualité, de moyen en fin — institutionalization of what was supposed to be transitional (salary differentials, executions for political dissent, concentration-camp work, propaganda double-sense, dialectique→zigzag). Against: orthodox marxism that maintains the line; anti-communist conservatism that rejects marxism wholesale; classical liberal or socialist analyses. Location: NY Pensée politique pp. 376–386; Mexico II/III antinomies sections; "Marxisme et Existentialisme" pp. 401–402.

  6. Claim (Mexico III synoptic statement): The metaphysical move is immanent in phenomenology, not subsequent to it: "La métaphysique n'est pas après la phénoménologie, elle est en elle, elle est elle-même, elle se confond avec la dimension d'existence" (p. 340). Métaphysique = "conscience de paradoxe, le contraire de pensée habituée." Not Aristotelian-teleological but Heideggerian — "la philosophie comme méditation infinie" + "art de percevoir à tous les niveaux." Christianity is closer than Theism: "Que signifie mort de Dieu sinon assomption de la finitude?... il faut que le Christ ignore qui est dieu, ignore les fins de Dieu et prenne la position de l'homme: *Seigneur pourquoi m'avez-vous abandonné?" Because: positing a System (God or Matter-Life-Spirit) destroys what it pretends to explain; the perspectives of the world are not subordinable to a higher non-perspective; perspectives are reciprocally interpretive (reprises l'une l'autre); vérité is "participation commune à travers ces perspectives, non comme suppression de ces perspectives, comme phénomène de perception, non comme passage à l'Être absolu." Against: theistic / metaphysical-system answers; Aristotelian teleology; Christian dogmatism; positivisme logique ("Le sens n'est que sens thématisé ou possédé. Bonne conscience philosophique" — vs the existentialist positivisme phénoménologique). Location: Mexico III pp. 340–342.

  7. Claim (Mexico III, autrui-positive): The four-stage dialectic of intersubjectivity culminates in "il faut partir parce que nous ne sommes pas à la fin des temps" (Beauvoir, Pyrrhus et Cinéas 1944) and Husserl's phénomène d'accouplement: "Reprise ou Nachvollzug, et cela, au niveau même de ma corporéité" (p. 327). The speculative impossibility of the alter-ego is practically overcome — like the perception of the inexhaustible thing — by the perceptive bond of intercorporeity. Solipsisme insurmontable (Husserl) at the level of self-feeling, but de jure surmounted at the level of action and expression. Because: speculative impossibility ("if I am, autrui is not, and if he is, I am not") is shown by Sartre to also generate a positive structure: "à l'intérieur même du désir de prendre, le désir de prendre quelqu'un, à l'intérieur même du sadisme le masochisme, à l'intérieur même de l'autorité, le dévouement... Il y a appel d'une liberté à une autre." Against: monological readings of intersubjectivity (Sartre's pure-conflict view; Hegelian total-recognition view); Pascalian "on n'aime jamais personne" (which "prétend épuiser par réflexion une opération existentielle"); Heidegger's Sein-zum-Tode as the structure of finitude. Location: Mexico II pp. 287–292; Mexico III pp. 324–327.

  8. Claim (NY Science and Philosophy): "Philosophy is the awareness of this original bond by virtue of which events, behaviors, social wholes become present to us before they are made into themes by the disciplines of the sciences. Science encompasses all there is to know with the exception of this original bond upon which the possibility of its own existence is founded" (p. 369). Recent epistemology forbids the notion of a closed science. Scientific laws "always involve a coefficient of facticity which makes it impossible to situate these laws in a realm distinct from the realm of events." Because: bodies fall toward earth's center because of earth's rotation speed; physical relations are linked to a conjuncture. "Scientific thinking remains always regressive." Gestalt theory's universe of physics is itself a universe of forms (forms being only perceived forms). Watson's behaviorism retains a scientist ontology despite its stream of activity intuition. Goldstein's Urbild gives the right model for sociology (Durkheim's summative is wrong). Erlebnis is the horizon: "Philosophical knowledge is not a knowledge apart, but a deeper perspective on objective knowledge itself" (p. 370). Against: Logical positivism / Carnapian physicalism; behaviorist ontology; Durkheimian summative sociology; the analytic conception of philosophy as proposition-clarification. Location: NY "Science and Philosophy" pp. 367–370 (English); pp. 371–375 (French ébauche).

Argumentative Movement

The volume does not have a single propositional structure; it forms, like Inédits I, a réseau of recurring thoughts across distinct manuscript groups. The argumentative movement of 1947–49 has two non-redundant advances beyond 1946–47:

  • March 1947 → 1947–48: from the Scandinavian conferences' cogito-épais / faire-être / homme en porte-à-faux matrix to the PPH course's massive Hegel-Marx-Marxism articulation. The political vocabulary of 1946 is now redeposited in the philosophical vocabulary of Phenomenology and Capital; the structural weight of the individu de classe / Gestalt / sélection naturelle triad emerges as the explicit theory of historical reason.

  • 1948 → 1949: from the PPH course to the Mexico conferences' synoptic six-stage existentialism (cogito → monde perçu → autrui → expression → antinomies de l'histoire → métaphysique-religion-existentialisme). This is MP's first synoptic public statement of his philosophy and, structurally, the bridge to the 1955 Adventures of the Dialectic. The New York "Pensée politique" lecture and the "Marxisme et existentialisme" lecture extend the political analysis to the bipolar 1949 world; the "Science and Philosophy" lecture extends the philosophical analysis to philosophy of science.

The fragments and dissertations show MP's operative concepts (genèse de la vérité, croyance, droit/fait, autrui, dialectical analysis, présent et passé) at the working pedagogical level — distinct from the conference register. The ENS "Métaphysique du langage" plan (Nov 1948–Jan 1949) is where MP works out the program that becomes La Prose du monde and the projected Recherches sur l'usage littéraire du langage.

Key Findings

  • The PPH course is the direct conceptual predecessor of the 1954–55 *Institution dans l'histoire personnelle et publique* course. The lineage is now explicit: PPH's individu de classe + logique de l'histoire + "Gestalten qui orientent le développement historique sans le nécessiter" become institution in 1954–55. MP's own 1955 marginal note (cited by Dalissier) confirms: "Pas de contradiction entre les deux Hegel; Hegel posant une logique de l'histoire invisible aux hommes... La vraie réaction contre Hegel doit aller contre sa conception du philosophe et pas seulement contre sa philosophie de l'histoire." Cf pph-as-direct-predecessor-of-institution-1955 (candidate).
  • The Sept 1948 N.D.L.R. in Temps Modernes is MP's earliest published use of "déhiscence" in connection with Hegel — predating V&I by 16 years. The Hegel/Trần Đức Thảo/Kojève triangle is the philological anchor.
  • The Mexico III conferences are MP's first synoptic public statement of his philosophy — the six-stage progression (cogito → monde perçu → autrui → expression → antinomies → métaphysique-religion) is the most concentrated single-document map of MP's 1947–49 thought, predating AD by six years and L'Œil et l'esprit by eleven.
  • The NY "Science and Philosophy" lecture is MP's earliest English-language statement of his philosophy of science. The doctrine "scientific thinking remains always regressive... a coefficient of facticity" is consistent with La Structure du comportement (1942) and Phénoménologie de la perception (1945) but stated in dialogue with Carnap-style positivism, Watson-style behaviorism, and Durkheimian sociology. The MP-Ayer encounter (probably January 1951) emerges from this 1949 articulation.
  • The Mexico III lecture contains MP's most extensive Ponge transcription in his corpus — including "L'épaisseur sémantique," "humus signifiant," the galet, the cageot. The lineage Ponge 1942 → Sartre on Ponge 1947 → MP Mexico III 1949 → MP V&I 1964 is the philological anchor for MP's late-career épaisseur d'être / chair vocabulary. Cf ponge-as-major-1949-source-for-mp-epaisseur (candidate).
  • The "Symbolisme du jeu" fragment is MP's earliest sustained engagement with Piaget (notes on La formation du symbole chez l'enfant, 1945) — earlier than the Sorbonne lectures (1949–52). MP's "Freud without demonology" position emerges here: "L'imago peut n'être qu'un schème" (Piaget); "Symbolisme inconscient > censuré: le symbole est essai de prise de conscience." Politzer's anti-Freud critique is integrated.
  • The "Lecture de Montaigne" ébauche is the manuscript draft of the published 1947 Causeries essay; completes the Wahl 1946 → MP HT preface 1947 → MP "Lecture de Montaigne" Dec 1947 en aucun cas genealogy first identified in Inédits I. MP locates Montaigne's "en aucun cas" at Essais III.VIII p. 167: "Toute inclinaison et soumission leur est due sauf celle de l'entendement."
  • The "Métaphysique du langage" plan (ENS Nov 1948–Jan 1949) is the embryonic plan for La Prose du monde and RULL — a nine-week passage from idealism/realism critique through Saussure, Guillaume, psychology of language, Paulhan/Blanchot/poetry, Stendhal/Stiftung/traditionality, painting, logical positivism, to praxis and history.
  • MP's 1955 letter to Lévi-Strauss (cited in editor's introduction) caps the future terminus of the PPH trajectory: MP rejects "marxisme strict" (proletariat as historical actor) but does not return to pré-marxisme; the formula is "une société neuve à construire pour le prolétariat, non par lui." This is the destination of the line PPH started in 1947–48.

Methodology (editorial)

Dalissier and Matsuba worked from photocopies of the manuscripts (no original access for several leaves). The editorial apparatus reproduces MP's marginalia, ratures, and idiosyncratic symbols (=, ≠, +/−, parallel-bars), and ambiguous decipherings (notation {A/B}). Page-paper analysis distinguishes Lyon-paper, Temps Modernes-paper, Queen Elizabeth-paper, New York-paper for dating purposes. The Mexican archival material (UNAM Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas) is mobilized for the first time, including correspondence with Mario Teodoro Ramírez Cobián (UMSNH) and identification of MP's interlocutors in the Hypérion group (Gaos, Villoro, Uranga, Guerra, Macgregor, Portilla, Zea, Samuel Ramos). PPH alone occupies ~110 pp. of editorial introduction; Mexico introduction ~60 pp.; NY introduction ~25 pp.

The PPH dating (1947–48) is established philologically: the course must be later than April 1947 (Kojève publication) and earlier than 1948–49 (where MP is on leave to America). Internal references to Kojève's Introduction (cited explicitly once) and to events through February 1948 (Czech coup) confirm the academic year 1947–48. The course's localization remains uncertain (probably Paris, possibly Lyon, on a "groupe d'études sociales et culturelles" that the editor was unable to identify in ministerial archives).

Concepts Developed

Concepts Referenced

  • reprise — extended to corporeal Nachvollzug (Mexico III p. 327) and to the developmental schema of "Genèse de la vérité" (p. 428: "Analyser le Nachvollzug").
  • pente-de-l-histoire — extended through PPH's "il y a logique de l'histoire non qu'elle aille toujours à conclusions mais parce qu'elle élimine d'elle-même les fausses solutions" (p. 188) to Mexico III's "Logique au sens d'élimination de l'impossible. Structures en histoire, non fatum logique" (p. 192).
  • logique-de-fait — culminating articulation: PPH p. 192.
  • institution — the individu de classe / logique de fait / Gestalten orientent sans nécessiter triad of PPH 1947–48 is the structural predecessor.
  • ambiguity-vs-ambivalence — extended by the Sept 1948 N.D.L.R. on Hegel as déhiscence/ambiguïté: "c'est la pensée de Hegel qui incarne maintenant l'ambiguïté" (Dalissier on N.D.L.R., p. 67 of editorial intro).
  • chiasm — proto-articulated in the Sept 1948 déhiscence formulation; the structural reciprocity formulae of Mexico III (perspectives reprises l'une l'autre) are 1949 anchors for the late chiasm.
  • primordial-expression — Mexico III: "pensée est expression" (p. 295); the most extensive Ponge transcription in MP's corpus.
  • perceptual-faith — NY Science and Philosophy English formulation: "the original bond... a bond of familiarity with others and with events."
  • two-historicities — PPH p. 195 critique of Hegel's "fonctionnaires" who alone see the Weltgeist, anticipates the 1952 Signs "Hegel is the Museum" image.
  • freud-without-demonology — the "Symbolisme du jeu" fragment is MP's earliest sustained Piaget-against-Freud articulation: "L'imago peut n'être qu'un schème"; Politzer's anti-Freud is integrated.
  • symbolic-matrix / primordial-symbolism — MP's Piagetian developmental reading: consciousness symbolic from beginning, language secondary.
  • homme-en-porte-a-faux — operative throughout; not explicitly named in 1947–49.
  • coexistence — Mexico II "le péché originel de la politique est celui de la vie à plusieurs" extends the 1946 articulation.
  • stiftung — explicitly cited in the Métaphysique du langage plan (week 6: "Stendhal... Stiftung, traditionnalité").
  • good-ambiguity — anticipated by the 1948 Hegel-as-déhiscence formulation.
  • mission-historique-du-proletariat (stub) — extensively articulated in PPH and Mexico V.

Terminology

French / Original English Attestation locations Translation notes
individu de classe class-individual / on de la classe PPH pp. 184, 186, 188, 192; "Passage de l'humanisme..." p. 201 The On of the class is the medium of history; replaces Durkheim's collective consciousness, Hegel's Weltgeist; structural predecessor of institution
logique de l'histoire / logique de fait logic of history / factual logic PPH pp. 188, 192; Mexico III p. 339 Subjective genitive: history's own logic (eliminating impossible) rather than logic imposed on history
pensée génétique genetic thought PPH p. 117 Hegel's procedure as MP reads it: junction of explanation and comprehension at the level of phenomena
reprise / Nachvollzug resumption / retaking PPH p. 188; Mexico III p. 327; "Genèse" p. 428 Now extended to corporeal Nachvollzug ("au niveau même de ma corporéité"); links to Husserl's Cartesian Meditations
déhiscence dehiscence TM N.D.L.R. Sept 1948 (cited p. 67 of ed. intro) MP's earliest published Hegel-déhiscence; "ne s'explique donc pas 'par en bas', mais pas davantage 'par en haut'"
L'expérience de l'Inconnu the Experience of the Unknown NY Pensée politique p. 379 The 1949 bipolar conjuncture: USSR ≠ socialism, USA ≠ classical capitalism
Imperium (vs. impérialisme) imperium / classical imperialism NY p. 379 Marshall-Plan-driven economic Imperium distinct from extractive imperialism
changement de quantité en qualité, de moyen en fin shift from quantity to quality, from means to end Mexico II p. 304; NY p. 378; ME p. 401 The "degeneration thesis" of stalinism — what was means becomes institutionalized end
Capital comme Phénoménologie de l'esprit concrète Capital as concrete Phenomenology of Spirit PPH p. 178; Mexico II p. 304 MP's signature reading of Marx
connaturalité connaturality Mexico II p. 285; Mexico III p. 319; NY (English) p. 369 The structural relation of subject to perceived object before intellectual constitution
coefficient of facticity (English) (idem) NY Science and Philosophy p. 367 Linked-to-conjuncture status of physical laws
original bond (English) bond originaire / connaturalité NY Science and Philosophy p. 369 The pre-thematic familiarity that science presupposes
logique titubante titubant logic / staggering logic "Métaphysique du langage" plan p. 480 "L'expression n'est portée par rien, logique rétrospective" — language's logic only appears in retrospect
L'épaisseur sémantique semantic thickness Mexico III pp. 318–319 (Ponge transcription) Ponge's term, transcribed by MP; feeds into late-MP épaisseur d'être
la philosophie comme méditation infinie philosophy as infinite meditation Mexico III p. 341 Heideggerian formulation; MP's anti-Aristotelian metaphysics
art de percevoir à tous les niveaux art of perceiving at all levels Mexico III p. 341; Filosofía y Letras The closing definition of philosophy in the Mexican synoptic
L'homme constituant the constituting human "Note sur Hegel et Sartre" PPH p. 195 Sole occurrence; load-bearing for the entire 1947–49 program

Key Passages

"La logique = phénoménologie formalisée — l'histoire = phénoménologie considérée dans sa réalisation extérieure" (PPH p. 117) — anchors pensée génétique and the unity of logic-history.

"Une logique de fait voilà ce que va nous offrir Hegel. En ce sens très loin de la pensée 'idéaliste': les idées mènent le monde: au sens de: les conceptions que se font les hommes" (PPH p. 117) — anchors logique de fait in Hegelian register.

"Maître et Esclave [est le] processus par lequel un système fait apparaître en lui-même ce qui le contredit et le nie. Détails non dans les Leçons sur la Philosophie de l'histoire, mais dans la Phénoménologie de l'esprit. Maître et esclave — Ontogenèse et histoire — L'institution de l'esclavage: développement figuré et visible d'un processus qui se produit en chacun" (PPH p. 128) — anchors the master/slave detour with the ontogenèse-history coupling.

"Au fond: la pensée de Hegel n'est pas à ses yeux différente en substance de celle du croyant — Nous croyons tous, humanistes chrétiens ou non, à la même chose — C'est le chrétien qui refusera cette assimilation" (PPH p. 144) — humanism / Christianity convergence.

"Le Capital est donc une Phénoménologie de l'esprit dans laquelle seulement l'esprit n'est pas séparé mais découvert dans les natures expressions matérielles sans lesquelles il n'est que rêve subjectif — Humanisme qui est naturalisme: nature humaine" (PPH p. 178) — Capital comme Phénoménologie de l'esprit concrète.

"La grande trouvaille de Marx, c'était l'individu de classe, le On porté à la fois par conditions matérielles et par subjectivités, médium de l'histoire" (PPH p. 186) — anchors the individu de classe concept.

"Logique au sens d'élimination de l'impossible. Structures en histoire, non fatum logique" (PPH p. 192) — anchors logique de l'histoire (subjective genitive).

"Tort de Hegel: définition trop humaniste de l'art... C'est aussi le défaut de Sartre dans Qu'est-ce que la littérature. Il y a quelque chose de plus valable que l'homme constitué, c'est l'homme constituant" (PPH p. 195) — anchors the silent key homme constituant.

"il faut en regarder en face l'énigme centrale, cette déhiscence qui ouvre à la nature et à l'histoire, mais qui a déjà son analogue à l'intérieur de la nature, et ne s'explique donc pas 'par en bas', mais pas davantage 'par en haut'" — N.D.L.R. Temps Modernes September 1948 (cited p. 67 of editorial intro). MP's earliest published déhiscence on Hegel.

"Existentialisme = expression littéraire aussi bien que philosophique. Homogénéité foncière. C'est que la métaphysique est dans l'expérience" (Mexico III p. 309) — anchors the métaphysique-as-conscience-de-paradoxe argument.

"Donc nous sommes néant, — mais néant qui vient au monde et ne se maintient que parce qu'il y est situé. Situation = facticité, qui n'est pas mal mais bien, et que cependant nous dépassons vers le monde et la totalisation du monde" (Mexico III p. 313) — anchors the cogito's two senses and situation dialectique.

"Pyrrhus et Cinéas: pourquoi partir puisqu'il faut revenir: il faut partir parce que nous ne sommes pas à la fin des temps" (Mexico III p. 326) — anchors the Beauvoir 1944 against Heidegger's Sein-zum-Tode.

"La métaphysique n'est pas après la phénoménologie, elle est en elle, elle est elle-même, elle se confond avec la dimension d'existence" (Mexico III p. 340) — anchors metaphysique-as-immanent-in-phenomenology.

"Cela suffit à faire dimension métaphysique, non au sens aristotélicien et téléologique, mais au sens heideggérien. La philosophie comme méditation infinie" (Mexico III p. 341) — anti-aristotelian, Heideggerian-aligned.

"Que signifie mort de Dieu sinon assomption de la finitude... il faut que le Christ ignore qui est dieu, ignore les fins de Dieu et prenne la position de l'homme: Seigneur pourquoi m'avez-vous abandonné?" (Mexico III p. 340) — the Hegelian-Christian secularization thesis.

"Pas même d'orgueil d'être homme donc, puisque être homme, c'est n'être rien — je ne suis pas moi, mais au delà, pas autrui, mais au delà... Humanisme qui ne pense jamais à l'homme comme concept, mais qui est tout en pratique en dialogue. Ne pas avoir l'orgueil d'être homme, mais l'être sans le dire et sans y penser" (Mexico III p. 341) — the humanism-without-species formula.

"Philosophy is the awareness of this original bond by virtue of which events, behaviors, social wholes become present to us before they are made into themes by the disciplines of the sciences. Science encompasses all there is to know with the exception of this original bond upon which the possibility of its own existence is founded... Philosophical knowledge is not a knowledge apart, but a deeper perspective on objective knowledge itself" (NY Science and Philosophy pp. 369–370) — the English-language statement of the philosophy-of-science doctrine.

"Au total 2 puissances principales: URSS qui ne représente pas socialisme, USA qui ne représente pas forme classique du capitalisme — ni forme libérale, ni forme impérialiste classique... L'expérience de L'Inconnu dans l'histoire du monde" (NY Pensée politique p. 379) — anchors the No man's land thesis.

"Le Cogito: certitude de l'existence pour soi avant les mots et pour que les mots aient un sens — Ayer: proposition compliquée, problématique" (Sig.[nification] p. 404) — anchors the Ayer encounter on cogito-as-proposition.

"L'imago peut n'être qu'un schème (Piaget) — assimilation des structures affectives entre elles et montages acquis... Symbolisme inconscient > censuré: le symbole est essai de prise de conscience" (Symbolisme du jeu p. 432) — anchors the Piaget-against-Freud reading.

"La vérité du scepticisme: tout est absurde et bêtise, oui mais: il faut vivre entre les vivants. C'est ainsi" (Lecture de Montaigne p. 440) — anchors the Montaigne reading and completes the en aucun cas genealogy.

Editorial (Dalissier) reproducing MP's marginalia in his ENS copy of Kojève's Introduction à la lecture de Hegel p. 25, on Kojève's claim that "L'histoire universelle... la dialectique du maître et de l'esclave": MP writes in the margin "Entre autres choses?" — anchors MP's quietly resistant reading of master/slave as "l'un parmi d'autres."

What's Not Obvious

  1. The PPH course "Le rationalisme de Hegel" never criticizes Hegel's rationalism explicitly. The title is the title MP himself gives the course's first part, but Part I is overwhelmingly paraphrase of Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of History. The critical work is delayed: it happens in Part II "De Hegel à Marx" and Part III "Autres textes." This delayed-critique structure is itself a finding — MP works via Hegel's voice, taking up the Hegelian articulation in detail, before opposing Marx to Hegel in the second movement. The 1955 Matériaux pour une théorie de l'histoire résumé will use the same phrase "Le rationalisme de Hegel est ainsi remis en question" — and Dalissier identifies this as a direct echo of the PPH course title. The PPH structure is not "Hegel critique → Marx" but "Hegel paraphrase → Hegel critique via Marx → Marxism realization." MP teaches Hegel's voice before he teaches MP's-Hegel.

  2. The PPH course makes the Capital central while citing its actual text barely twice. The reading-notes that MP took on the Manuscrits de 1844, the Critique de la philosophie de l'État, and the Idéologie allemande are extensive (pp. 169–186); but the Capital itself appears only at pp. 178 and Mexico II p. 304 — with the same single citation ("Ce qui distingue d'emblée le plus mauvais architecte de la meilleure abeille, c'est qu'il construit l'alvéole dans sa tête avant de la construire en cire" — Capital I, on productive labor). Yet MP nonetheless declares "Le Capital est donc une Phénoménologie de l'esprit concrète" (p. 178) — a thesis far stronger than this single passage warrants. The thesis is not derived from a sustained reading of the Capital; it is the philosophical thesis that MP defends through a strategic engagement with the early Marx, projected forward onto the late Marx. This 1947–48 projection is what becomes the 1961 Philosophie et non-philosophie course's "Marx hégélien d'un bout à l'autre" — but the evidence base for the thesis is the early manuscripts, not the Capital.

  3. The Mexico III conferences read like Phenomenology of Perception in conference form, but with a 1949 political diagnosis as their fifth movement. The progression cogito → monde perçu → autrui → expression → antinomies → métaphysique-religion-existentialisme inverts the structure of PhP (which works up from perception to higher levels) by ending in metaphysics and religion. But the fifth movement (antinomies de la vie collective, antinomies de l'esprit et de la politique) is a new element not present in PhP — a post-1947 Humanisme et terreur political diagnosis grafted onto the perceptual-existential PhP program. This grafting is structurally significant: Mexico III is not a republication of PhP, but the first synoptic statement that integrates the post-HT political work into the 1945 perceptual program. The "no man's land" of 1949 enters MP's philosophical synthesis here. MP's claim that "la métaphysique est dans l'expérience" (Mexico III opening) carries the entire program: the 1947 political experience is itself a moment within MP's ontological investigation, not a departure from it. Cf mexico-iii-as-synoptic-1947-49-mp-program (candidate).

Critique / Limitations

  • The volume is approximately 60% editorial apparatus and 40% MP's own notes. The Dalissier introductions are extensive (~110 pp. for PPH alone, ~60 pp. for Mexico, ~25 pp. for NY) and constructive: they reconstruct MP's positions through extensive secondary literature (Bellantone, Whiteside, Saint Aubert, Cohen-Solal, Hurtado on Mexican philosophy). Readers should distinguish (i) MP's notes (often elliptical), (ii) Dalissier's reconstructions (often interpretive), (iii) the apparatus's bibliographic precision (which is exceptional). The PPH dating to 1947–48 is itself an editorial thesis — defended in detail (pp. 39–43) but arguable.
  • Several leaves are photocopy-only and decipherment is sometimes ambiguous ({A/B} notation). Where the text is contested, MP's intent is reconstructed from rature-patterns and from cross-attestations.
  • The Mexico Conférence I ("Première version") is barely sketched (3 pp.); the principal Mexico documents are versions II and III. The third ("L'existentialisme français et ses problèmes") is the most polished but also the most retrospective — composed possibly aboard the Queen Elizabeth on the way to America.
  • The Lukács reading-notes are in German (untranslated by MP, the Costes/Molitor French was unavailable for Der junge Hegel). MP's German reading is competent but the editor's decipherment is laborious.
  • The "Lecture de Montaigne" ébauche is undated; the assumption that it's the 1947 manuscript draft of the December 1947 Causeries essay is editorial.
  • The NY "Science and Philosophy" lecture exists in two versions (English + French ébauche). The English version is MP's actual delivered text (with corrections by his "friend S. H." — Sidney Hook? Stephen Heath?). The French ébauche is more elaborate but does not include all the English's Carnap/Watson/Durkheim references.

Connections

  • is the chaînon manquant of Inédits I (1946–1947) — the second of the two volumes; cross-volume references from Inédits I to "In. II" can now be checked here.
  • is the direct conceptual predecessor of *Institution dans l'histoire personnelle et publique* (1954–55) — the individu de classe / logique de l'histoire / Gestalten triad of PPH 1947–48 becomes institution in 1954–55. Cf pph-as-direct-predecessor-of-institution-1955 (candidate).
  • is the laboratory of *Adventures of the Dialectic* (1955) — the no man's land / changement de quantité en qualité / individu de classe analyses of 1949 are systematized in AD.
  • contains the embryonic plan for *La Prose du monde* (1950–51) — the ENS Métaphysique du langage course (Nov 1948–Jan 1949) outlines the program; "Le problème de la genèse" + "L'origine de la vérité" sketch the projected book on the origin of truth.
  • prefigures *The Visible and the Invisible* (1959–61) — the Sept 1948 N.D.L.R. on "déhiscence" is MP's earliest published déhiscence-on-Hegel, predating V&I by 16 years. The 1949 connaturality / original bond (NY) is the perceptual articulation of what V&I will name flesh.
  • engages Hegel Lectures on the Philosophy of History + Phenomenology of Spirit + Principles of the Philosophy of Right + Aesthetics — extensively in PPH I.
  • engages Marx Critique of the Philosophy of Right + 1844 Manuscripts + German Ideology — extensively in PPH II.
  • engages Lenin State and Revolution — reading-notes in PPH III.
  • engages Trotsky — Brest-Litovsk, "se jeter sur le cheval," Terrorismus und Kommunismus — recurrently across PPH and the conferences.
  • engages Lukács Der junge Hegel — German reading-notes in PPH III.
  • responds to Aron Introduction à la philosophie de l'histoire (1938) — the [Aron] segment of PPH and the 6 February 1947 Collège philosophique exchange (reported by Fessard). Cf Phase 8 candidate, deferred — slug pph-as-aron-response.
  • is influenced by but resists Kojève's Introduction à la lecture de Hegel (1947) — MP's marginalia "Entre autres choses?" on master/slave totalization is the philological evidence.
  • is informed by Groethuysen's 1924 NRF article on Hegel and the State — the chief commentator-source for PPH I, in place of Hyppolite (whose Introduction à la philosophie de l'histoire de Hegel, 1948, is not cited — confirming the PPH 1947–48 dating).
  • contrasts with Hyppolite's Marxisme et philosophie (Nov 1946) — same title as MP's June–July 1946 essay; both authors trace early-Marx via aliénation but with different methodological emphases (philological vs phenomenological).
  • contains the September 1948 N.D.L.R. on Trần Đức Thảo's recension of Kojève's Introduction — anonymously signed by MP as TM gérant; the philological anchor for MP's earliest déhiscence-on-Hegel.
  • engages Ponge Le parti pris des choses (1942) — extensively in Mexico III; the most extensive Ponge transcription in MP's corpus, anchoring the philological lineage to late-MP épaisseur d'être. Cf ponge-as-major-1949-source-for-mp-epaisseur (candidate).
  • engages Piaget La formation du symbole chez l'enfant (1945) — the "Symbolisme du jeu" fragment is MP's earliest sustained Piaget engagement; the Politzer-against-Freud thread is integrated.
  • engages Breton L'amour fou (1937) — Mexico III on the cristallisation du désir.
  • engages Malraux / Kahnweiler — Mexico III on the painted object's history.
  • engages Montaigne Essais III — the "Lecture de Montaigne" ébauche, manuscript draft of the December 1947 Causeries published essay; completes the en aucun cas genealogy.
  • engages Bergson Matière et mémoire — the dissertation notes "Présent et passé" + "Exposé sur Bergson."
  • anchors MP's relation with the Hypérion group in Mexico (Gaos, Villoro, Zea, Uranga, Macgregor, Portilla, Samuel Ramos) — first MP-Mexico documented engagement.
  • anchors MP's American friendships (Schapiro, Rosenberg, Bernard Wolfe) — through correspondence reproduced in editorial introduction.
  • contains the only documentary trace of the PPH course: MP's letter to Hyppolite (24 rue de la Tour) about the projected "groupe d'études sociales et culturelles" with Sartre, Alquié, Hyppolite — none of which projects materialized except for MP's own course.

Sources

The volume is itself a primary source. Cross-references in the editorial apparatus, drawn upon for this page:

  • A. Bellantone, Hegel en France (2 vols, Hermann, 2011) — the Hegel-Renaissance background for PPH.
  • K. Whiteside, Merleau-Ponty and the Foundations of an Existential Politics (Princeton, 1988) — the political philosophy framework.
  • E. de Saint Aubert, Du lien des êtres aux éléments de l'être (Vrin, 2004); Être et chair (Vrin, 2013) — period context.
  • A. Cohen-Solal, Sartre 1905–1980 (Gallimard, 1999) — the Sartre-Mexico-1949 episode.
  • M. Poster, Existential Marxism in Postwar France (Princeton, 1975) — the existential Marxism reception background.
  • M. Dalissier, La métaphysique chez Merleau-Ponty (Peeters, 2017) — Dalissier's prior systematic treatment.
  • G. Hurtado on the Mexican Hypérion group; L. Villoro, "Génesis y proyecto del existencialismo en México" (1949) — the Mexican-philosophy framework.
  • J. Hyppolite, "Marxisme et philosophie" Revue socialiste (Nov 1946); "De la structure du Capital" Bulletin SFP (10 April 1948); Introduction à la philosophie de l'histoire de Hegel (Aubier, 1948) — the parallel Hegel-Marx work that Dalissier reads alongside PPH.
  • É. Weil, Hegel et l'État (Vrin, 1950, with appendix "Marx et la philosophie du droit") — the parallel reading.
  • Trần Đức Thảo, recension of Kojève's Introduction in Temps Modernes September 1948 — with MP's anonymous N.D.L.R. response.
  • Filosofía y Letras 33 (Mexico, 1949) — official program of MP's six conferences.
  • A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth, and Logic (1936); The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge (1940) — sources for the MP-Ayer encounter.