Deconstruction and Taoism Reconsidered Fu Hungchu PDF

Deconstruction and Taoism: Comparisons Reconsidered
Author(s): Hongchu Fu
Source: Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 29, No. 3 (1992), pp. 296-321
Published by: Penn State University Press
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Deconstruction and Taoism: Comparisons

Reconsidered
HONGCHU FU
Since Derrida launched a wholesale dismantling of Western metaphysics

and occasionally referred to the Chinese language as a model of the Other
for his deconstruct ive strategy, there has appeared a sustained endeavor to
discover some possible affinity between deconstruction and classical Chi-
nese thought, especially Taoism. l Scholars and students from China and
elsewhere have tried in one way or another to establish some correspond
dence between the two. Ye Xiushan and Donald Wesling, for instance,
have connected Derrida's deconstruction with Lao Tzu's thought, the
former assuming that "Derrida's 'trace* seems closer than Heidegger's
'Dasein' to Lao Tzu's thought" and the latter asserting that Derrida's
philosophy is "an incomplete Taoism."2 Zhang Longxi, on the other
hand, has done fairly thorough research in the Chinese language system
in connection with the deconstructive view of a hierarchy between
speech and writing. After illustrating the affinity between Tao and logos,
Zhang also claims that "[Tao] hardly needed to wait till the twentieth
century for the dismantling of phonetic writing, for the Derridean sleight
of hand, the strategy of deconstruction."3 To him, "Tao" was obviously

already deconstructed by the Chinese themselves almost two millennia
ago. Michelle Yeh goes further and devotes a lengthy essay to the specific
treatment of the relationship between Derrida and Chuang Tzu (c. 369286 B.C.), one of the founding fathers of Taoism, analyzing what she
calls their similar purposes, styles and themes.4
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES, Vol. 29, No. 3, 1992.

Copyright 1992 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA
DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 297
That deconstruction and Daoism would run across each other's trajectory and be relegated to the same critical category comes not by coincidence. Derrida's often deliberately playful style in his deconstruction of
Western metaphysics naturally reminds one of the Taoist attitude of relativity to worldly affairs, especially Chuang Tzu's proposal of "going rambling without a destination (xiao yao you)." As A. C. Graham remarks of
Lao Tzu and Derrida, "the parallel is indeed so striking that there is
danger of missing the difference."5 But are there really essential similarities
between deconstruction and Taoism, as Michelle Yeh holds in her demon-
stration? Was "Tao" self-deconstructed or was the Chinese hierarchy of

speech over writing overturned too long ago to be worthy of, as the tone
of Zhang Longxi's essay seems to suggest, any deconstructive application?
It is essentially an urge to address these issues further that has prompted
me to embark on a comparative study of deconstruction and Taoism by

analyzing the views held by some of the above-mentioned scholars, specifi-
cally those of Yeh. Since one must be aware of the immensely diverse
scope of uses to which both the terms "deconstruction" and "Taosim"
could apply, I will confine myself mainly to the kind of deconstruction
practiced by Derrida and the Taoism of Chuang Tzu and Lao Tzu in my
use of the terms.
Since many issues arise out of misunderstanding or misinterpreting deconstruction, let us start with Derrida's deconstructive strategy. In the intro-
ductory part of her essay, Michelle Yeh states that deconstruction and
Taoism are comparable because "ideologically, both thinkers take the
stand of anti-tradition and anti-convention, underlying which is a force-
ful revaluation of the system of traditional thinking"(95). "The common

denominator of [such traditional or conventional thought]," as Yeh goes
on to say, "can be termed dualistic conceptualization"(96). This is certainly true of Derrida's deconstruction as he tells Houdebine: "what has
seemed necessary and urgent to me, in the historical situation which is
our own, is a general determination of the conditions for the emergence
and the limits of philosophy, of metaphysics, of everything that carries it
on and that it carries on."6 By metaphysics Derrida here means more

specifically "logocentrism," which produces such oppositions as speech/
writing, nature/culture, origin/history and so on. In each of those opposi-
298 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES
tions, the former term has always been prioritized over the latter simply
on the basis of the former's supposedly full "presence" or its plenitude of
meaning. It is Derrida's intention, then, to reverse or to deconstruct such
artificial hierarchies either by pointing out the contradiction in Saussure's
theory of linguistics concerning the nature of language (language operates
by differentiation) and the relationship between speech and writing, or by
analyzing closely the impasse involved, say, in Rousseau's narrative of the
definition for and function of such concepts as "nature" and "education,"
"speech" and "writing."7 Under Derrida's scrutiny, then, these hierarchies
are overturned by themselves. It is obvious but nevertheless significant

that Derrida has from the outset employed nothing other than its own
interior logic to dismantle metaphysics.
Such reversion of the traditional hierarchies is possible and necessary

mainly because of what Derrida calls "undecidables," a term he adopted
early and uses more often in his more recent works such as Dissemination,
Post Card, and Limited Inc. As he explains the term, "undecidables" are
analogically
. . . unities of simulacrum, "false" verbal properties (nominal or
semantic) that can no longer be included within philosophical
(binary) opposition, but which, however, inhabit philosophical
opposition, resisting and disorganizing it, without ever constituting
a third term, without ever leaving room for a solution in the form
of speculative dialectics. (Positions 43, original emphasis)
Thus, the "pharmakon" becomes neither remedy nor poison; the "supple-
ment" is neither the outside of an inferiority nor a complement of the

inside; by the same token, the "hymen" is neither consummation nor
virginity. The list could be extended endlessly. What Derrida tries to
point out is that these terms become undecidables not because they are
themselves ambiguous or polysemous but rather because of the way in
which the words are inscribed in the text, or in other words, because of
the relationship they have with others in the text that makes the mean-
ings of those terms undecidables or paradoxes. In analyzing the word

"hymen" in Mallarm's short text "Mimique," Derrida illustrates his point
in quite straightforward terms:
What counts here is not the lexical richness, the semantic infiniteness of a word or concept, its depth or breadth, the sedimentation
that has produced inside it two contradictory layers of signification
(continuity and discontinuity, inside and outside, identity and

difference, etc.)- What counts here is the formal or syntactical
praxis that composes and decomposes it.8
Because of this syntactic structure, whenever one of the senses pertaining
to the term is used in the context, it will be, by the necessity of the formal
praxis required by the same context, opposed or rejected or replaced by

other senses; hence none is logically suitable to one and the same text.
Why and how do all these occur in a seemingly uncanny manner? Let
us trace Derrida's thought further. The idea of undecidables here reminds
us of GdePs Incompleteness Theorem, which Derrida takes notice of in

his early work on HusserFs The Origin of Geometry and later actually
acknowledges for his analogical use of the term "undecidable":
Allusion, or "suggestion" as Mallarm says elsewhere, is indeed that
operation we are here by analogy calling undecidable. An undecid-
able proposition, as Gdel demonstrated in 1931, is a proposition

which, given a system of axioms governing a multiplicity, is neither
an analytical nor deductive consequence of those axioms, nor in

contradiction with them, neither true nor false with respect to those
axioms. (Dissemination 219, original emphasis)

This is a crudely depicted model of GdePs theorem. Because of its reconditeness and complexity, only a few professionals working specifically in
the field of mathematical logic really understand the details of GdePs

proof. That is why the possible consequences or implications of GdePs
epoch-making theorem have often been misinterpreted.9 For our purposes, however, it suffices to understand the crucial concept involved in
GdePs theorem, i.e., the idea of self-referentiality. Almost all the prob-
lems leading to GdePs proof and his proof per se are closely connected
with self-referentiality. To put it roughly, GdePs theorem indicates that
as a part of a formalized system, any attempt from within to determine or
fully account for the entire system by formalistic means cannot be guaran-
teed. In other words, a full description or understanding of a formalistic

system cannot rest on the rules or laws generated from within itself, but
only on those from other than itself Many of Derrida's examples fall precisely within this category.
In "Plato's Pharmacy," for instance, Derrida analyzes the structure un-
derlying a mythological god (Thoth) told in different cultures, and he

demonstrates how Plato's designation of the identity of Thoth, the god of
writing in Egyptian mythology, becomes problematic or "undecidable." In
Plato's description, Thoth (Theuth) is virtually a nonidentity since "not a
single concrete characteristic is attributed to him" (Dissemination 86). He
is therefore secondary to all other characteristics - father, life, speech,

sun, etc. However, as Derrida points out, judging from the "situation he
occupies, the content of his speeches and operations, and the relations
among the themes, concepts, and signifiers in which his interventions are
engaged," Thoth nonetheless possesses "the features of a strongly marked
figure" so much so that he can be justly considered whatever is opposite to
his characteristics (Dissemination 86). It is in this sense that Derrida
concludes: "The system of these traits brings into play an original kind of
logic: the figure of Thoth is opposed to the other (father, son, life,
speech, origin or orient, etc.), but as that which at once supplements and
supplants it. Thoth extends or opposes by repeating and replacing. By the
same token, the figure of Thoth takes shape and takes its shape from the
very thing it resists and substitutes for" (Dissemination 93). In a sense, the
very absence of Thoth's identity, the secondariness of his position, becomes exactly the precondition for the potential identity he at once
opposes and replaces. All this is possible only because, as one can see
now, of the way (or "the structural laws") in which Thoth is inscribed.
This "original kind of logic" takes place only because of the interweaving
of a two-level operation of the character: an assertive (nonidentity) and a
performative act. Hence, the "double bind" or the self-referentiality discussed above. Understood in this way, "the god of writing is thus at once
his father, his son, and himself (Dissemination 93).

In his "Le Facteur de la Vrit," as another example, Derrida takes issue
with Freud's psychoanalysis of the Oedipus myth and of Hans Christian

Anderson's "The Emperor's New Clothes" by pointing out the hidden fact
that actually both stories have already contained Freud's analysis, or

Freud's text. It is "a fold in the text ... a structural complication which
envelops his discourse" that Freud fails to take notice of.10 The consequences are, as Derrida immediately asks,
What happens in the psychoanalytic deciphering of a text when
the latter, the deciphered itself, already explicates itself? When it
says more about itself than does the deciphering (a debt acknowl-
edged by Freud more than once)? And especially when the

depichered text inscribes in itself additionally the scene of the deci-
phering? (The Post Card 414, original emphasis).

It is obvious that this self-referentiality, this mise en abme, leads us back
to the loop of Gdel's undecidabilities. One should be aware that it is not
that there is no difference between the literary tales and Freud's analytical
text in this case. The crux lies in the fact that "their co-implication is
more contorted than one might believe" (The Post Card 418).
If these are only peculiar cases of the issue involving self-referentiality,
their potential significances or repercussions lead inevitably to the more
general and hence more disturbing issue concerning the status of any text
or even the whole enterprise of literature considered as an institution. If
literature is to be understood to mean a description or a putting on stage,
as Derrida phrases it, of a "fact" or a "truth" that literary theory or any
theories consider their duty to interpret or unravel by means - the only
means available - of language, how is it possible that such a "fact" or

"truth" can be accounted for in its plenitude by nothing other than theories
which literature in a way already contains within itself? To put the issue
in more explicit terms, since the means of "literature" is language and that
of analysis is also language, how can the analysis disentangle itself from
what it is analyzing? In this regard, since "[literature] is more powerful
than the truth of which it is capable," asks Derrida, "Does such a literature' permit itself to be read, to be questioned, or even deciphered according to the psychoanalytic schmas that have emerged from what this
literature itself produces?" (The Post Card 419).
One can recognize that when these issues are high-lighted under theoretical scrutiny as is done by Derrida, the erroneous ideas or inconsistent
presuppositions are as obvious to see as the reason accounting for the
proverbial egg stood on its end by Christopher Columbus. The issue at
stake, however, is that in practice interpreters are liable to forget the yoke
of the ubiquitous metaphysics or to ignore the complications arising out of

self-referentiality. Their arguments, as a result, sometimes fall into what
Derrida calls "kettle-logic," a term he borrows from Freud's psychoanalysis
(Dissemination 111 or The Post Card 482). That is why there is so much
resistance to deconstruct ion, even among highly academic institutions,
and this resistance is precisely what interests Derrida. Accordingly, his
more recent efforts have been mainly directed at the problematization of

the notion of institution taken as a complete and systematic whole.
II
Let us return to our comparative topic. The above sketch of Derrida's

deconstructive strategy indicates Derrida's aim at Western metaphysics,
which crumbles under his close rational scrutiny. What, then, about
Taoism as advocated by Chuang Tzu? Michelle Yeh is certainly right
when she points out the anti-conventional or anti-traditional characteris-
tics of Taoism, if by tradition and convention are meant the Confucian

doctrine and conventional epistemology. Guo Xiang, one of the important commentators on the Chuang Tzu described the book long ago as full
of "wild language."11 Fung Yu-lan also mentions that "The Taoists were
opposed to the Confucianists's treatment of jen [benevolence] and yi [righ-
teousness]."12 But sheer unconventionality or anti-traditionality alone

does not necessarily constitute essential similarity between Taoism and
deconstruction. One ought to explore further how the Taoist doctrine
goes against conventions and in what way it is unique in its ontological
and epistemological stance.
"The major concern for Chuang Tzu (and early Chinese philosophers
for that matter)," Yeh explains, "is the nominalistic aspect of language
and its emotive effect on man. As Chuang Tzu sees it, the most problem-
atic area in this regard is the binary oppositions embedded in language"

(101). This is no doubt true in that Chuang Tzu in his book does analyze
by means of a series of parables the arbitrariness or the relativity of such
binary distinctions as being vs. non-being, true vs. false, good vs. bad, use
vs. uselessness, or large vs. small. In his discourse on the relativity of

being and non-being, Chuang Tzu thus illustrates:
There is a beginning. There is a not yet beginning to be a

beginning. There is a not yet beginning to be a not yet beginning
to be a beginning. There is being. There is nonbeing. There is a

not yet beginning to be a nonbeing. There is a not yet beginning
to be a not yet beginning to be nonbeing. Suddenly there is a nonbeing. But I do not know, when it comes to nonbeing. 13
In another paragraph, Chuang Tzu talks about "the use of the useless" in a
slightly altered manner:
Said Hui Shih to Chuang Tzu:

"These sayings of yours are useless."
"It's only with people who know about the useless that there is
any point in talking about uses. In all the immensity of heaven and
earth, a man uses no more than is room for his feet. If recognizing
this we were to dig away the ground round his feet all the way
down to the Underworld, would it still be useful to the man?"
"It would be useless."
"Then it is plain that the useless does serve a use."14
It is obvious that by these parables Chuang Tzu tries to show the

arbitrariness of value judgment from any individual point of view. Nothing is absolute, as he goes on philosophizing:
Everything has its "that," everything has its "this." From the
point of view of "that" you cannot see it, but through understanding you can know it. So I say, "that" comes out of "this" and "this"
depends on "that" - which is to say that "this" and "that" give

birth to each other. (Watson 39)
Aware of this binary opposition, the Taoist sage proposes a sort of transcendence beyond the conventional epistemology by adopting what might
be called a Taoist stance whereby one (the observer) is said to be identical
with the myriad of things, hence to him everything is equal with every-
thing else (qi <wu - seeing things as equal). Here is Chuang Tzu's own
conclusion:
Therefore the sage does not proceed in such a way, but illuminates
all in the light of Heaven. He too recognizes a "this," but a "this"

which is also "that," a "that" which is also "this." His "that" has
both a right and wrong in it; his "this" too has both a right and
wrong in it. So, in fact, does he still have a "this" and "that"? Or
does he in fact no longer have a "this" and "that"? A state in which
"this" and "that" no longer find their opposites is called the hinge
of the Way. When the hinge is fitted into the socket, it can
respond endlessly. Its right then is a single endlessness and its
wrong too is a single endlessness. (Watson 40)
At first sight, it is indeed quite tempting to affirm the similarity be-
tween Derrida and Chuang Tzu, if one merely compares the syntactic
phrasing here with that found in some Derridean passages. The important
thing, however, is to make clear what is really meant by Chuang Tzu and
what is the basic pattern of his world outlook underlying the passages
here.
Fung Yu-lan, in commenting on Chuang Tzu's point of view, explains:

"Although all things differ, they are alike in that they all constitute
something and are good for something. They all equally come from the
Tao. Therefore from the viewpoint of the Tao, things, though different,
yet are united and become one."15 This Taoist viewpoint, as Benjamin
Schwartz remarks, involves "a rejection of the absolute categories of predication which we bring to our perceptions."16 As a result of this thorough
rejection, then, there is no distinction but only undifferentiation left

among all things. Thus viewed, Chuang Tzu's is an essentially relativistic
epistemology or, as Fang Dong-mei calls it, "the system of essential relativ-
ity."17 Starting from seeing through the relative nature in everything,

Chuang Tzu concludes by announcing that everything is equal to others.
This he considers the true knowledge or the view of the mystic Tao. To
achieve that goal, Chuang Tzu proposes a sort of "forgetting," i.e., forgetting oneself and "going rambling without a destination (xiao yao you)"
(Graham, Chuang-tzu 43).
Here then is a connection to Derrida, who has also often been accused
of being "skeptic-relativist-nihilist," especially for his notion of "free play"
jeu that occurred in his early writings. 18 This is such a widespread misunderstanding of deconstruction at large that a clarification ought to come
in the first place for any proper discussion on Derrida. For the "double
reading" or "doubling commenting" that Derrida proposes is nothing
other than a close reading that will at the same time "paraphrase, unveil,
reflect, reproduce a text, Commenting' on it" so as to lay bare whatever is
at work within the text itself (Limited Inc. 146). Cautioning his readers
against the "inadequate translation" of the French word jeu into "freeplay," Derrida emphasizes in particular that he has never proposed "a kind
of 'all or nothing' choice between pure realization of self-presence and
complete freeplay or undecidability" (Limited Inc. 115). All he tries to do
is to point out certain inherently unresolvable problems inhabiting the

laws and regulations that govern the interpretative processes, although his
folding and unfolding of the textual fabric frequently go against the grain.
If I understand Derrida correctly, while he considers it very important

to spot certain rhetorical undecidables at work within a language system,
he nevertheless does not lose sight of some discursive stability by virtue of
various relatively stable contextual constraints. That is what he means, I
think, when he says: "within interpretive contexts (that is, within rela-
tions of force that are always differential - for example, socio-political'

institutional - but even beyond these determinations) that are relatively
stable, sometimes apparently almost unshakable, it should be possible to

invoke rules of competence, criteria of discussion and of consensus, good
faith, lucidity, rigor, criticism, and pedagogy" (Limited Inc. 146, emphasis
mine). As a matter of fact, in discussing the two terms "undecidability"

and "indeterminacy," Derrida prefers the former precisely because it is "a
determinate oscillation between possibilities" rather than some vague indeterminacy (Limited Inc. 148, original emphasis).
On these grounds, Michelle Yen's comparison of deconstruction with
Chuang Tzu's Taoism falls short of her aim not because of her misinterpretation of Chuang Tzu; in fact, she correctly points out that Chuang Tzu's
demonstration of the uses of the useless by a series of parables does not
merely serve to illustrate that "values are relative and perspective-bound,
but that all values are relative and arbitrary because they are external to
the intrinsic nature of the things under consideration" (104). While
Derrida will perhaps not dispute Chuang Tzu's contention that all values
are essentially arbitrary, he will, however, according to the above passage,
recognize at the same time "relatively stable" contexts, which make the
"criteria of discussion," "rigor," "criticism," etc. possible. Yeh's comparison, therefore, fails to carry its due weight because of her misunderstanding of Derrida, whom she apparently takes to be a relativist philosopher
like Chuang Tzu.
The implied distinction between what Yeh calls "the nature of the
things under consideration" and the human "values" expounded by

Chuang Tzu leads to her lengthy discussion about the affinity between
Derrida's diffrance and Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu's notion of "Tao" in
terms of what she takes to be their similar images, functions, and implica-
tions. This is a complicated issue because it necessitates a proper under-
standing of the notion "Tao," which has been variously interpreted over
the centuries. Some link it to the mysterious all-almighty Creator, some
think of it as the basic element in the cosmos, others speak of it as more or
less an equivalent to Western "logos," while still others tend to treat it as
the totality of all things or the ultimate reality.19 According to some

modern studies, Tao has even been connected with natural laws. Joseph
Needham, for instance, holds that the Tao is "the Order of Nature, which
brought all things into existence and governs their every action, not so
much by force as by a kind of natural curvature in space and time, . . .
controlling the orderly process of change."20 Thus understood, Tao appears similar to diffrance, which is "neither a word nor a concept" but
only a "movement."21 In a sense, diffrance may also be understood as a
kind of the order of Nature, operating independently of man's will.
An important distinction should be drawn, however, between what

diffrance or Tao may be and how they are understood or perceived by
Derrida and the Taoist masters. A law of nature in itself and men's
depiction or the manifestation of their knowledge of this law are two

different things. It is precisely here that diffrance is to be distinguished
from the Tao. Derrida repeatedly tries via his demonstration of the operation of diffrance to point out the pattern of differentiation underlying
everything, excluding any myth of "presence" or "transcendental signified," wheras the delineation of Tao given by Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu,
mystic though it is occasionally, is permeated in varying degrees with a
presupposition that it is a whole and complete entity, an ultimate or
absolute realm, whether "Tao" is depicted as "the Great One" (da yi,
Watson ch. 33) or "Elusiveness" (huang hu),22 or "Something undefined
yet complete" (you <wu hun cheng, Ren ch. 25) or "Chaos" (hun tun,
Watson ch. 7) or even "Non-being" (wu, Ren chs. 11 and 41).
It is this presupposition of a complete entity or an ultimate realm
characteristic of Tao that functions as - albeit a mystic or imaginative
operation - what Kant would perhaps call the noumenal world as opposed
to the phenomenal one. And it is precisely in this regard that the notion
of Tao may be yet another version of logocentric metaphysics. Zhang
Longxi is not unjustified in connecting Tao with logos and demonstrating
persuasively the hierarchy of speech over writing found in China as well as
in the West. What remains puzzling, however, is his somewhat arbitrary
conclusion reached at the end of his essay, where he asserts that Tao is
different in a way from Western logos because "In the Chinese tradi-
tion . . . the power of writing as such avenged itself the very moment it
was debased; the metaphysical hierarchy was thus already undermined

when it wad established" (397). If Chinese writing has, as Zhang has
correctly pointed out, on the one hand been "debased" from speech the
same as in Western metaphysics - "Writing cannot fully convey the
speech, and speech cannot fully convey the meaning"23 - and yet curiously it has on the other hand been often identified with the writer
himself and so been given priority over speech in this case, this apparent
paradox or inconsistency does not indicate, as Zhang claims, that "the

metaphysical hierarchy was thus already undermined when it was estab-
lished." The Chinese philosophical tradition and its language system are
so different from their Western counterparts that they deserve more care-
ful investigations and require further thought before any conclusion can
be convincingly drawn.
There are two reasons I would like to advance here. First, the Western
metaphysics of presence is not merely a matter concerning the hierarchy
of speech over writing and Derrida is far from denying the fact that writing
derives from speech. The empirical or de facto truth that speech comes
before writing Derrida considers universal, which can be demonstrated by
simply juxtaposing an Aristotelian definition of language: "Spoken words
are the symbols of mental experience and written words are the symbols of
spoken words" (qtd. in Of Grammatobgy 30) with the passage from the
Appendixes to the I Ching [Book of Changes] cited above. However, this de
facto truth should not be confused with a de jure argument that takes the
empirical truth as a base for further claims on essence and metaphysics,
i.e., equating truth with self-present speech, as Derrida makes it very

explicit: "[the factum of phonetic writing] does not respond to any neces-
sity of an absolute and universal essence"(Of Grammatobgy 31). The

focus of Derrida's critique of Western logocentrism is precisely on this
confusion. As for the Chinese hierarchy of speech over writing, I think on
a philosophical level there is no question about the hierarchy of idea,

speech, and writing for the Chinese, who acknowledge this empirical
truth the same as Westerners. This alone, as is explained above, does not
constitute logocentrism. On the other hand, the confusion of de facto
empiricism with de jure argumentation that Derrida has pointed out in
Western metaphysics does not find its equivalent in China, because here I agree with James Liu - "[Taoists] regard writing and oral speech
with equal skepticism and treat both in the same paradoxical fashion"
(23). The Chinese emphasis on writing as Zhang Longxi has enumerated

has of course something to do with its nature of graphic inscription and it
is, as far as I can see, not because of the relationship between speech and
writing. In other words, the Chinese hierarchy of speech over writing and
the Chinese emphasis on writing are two separate issues, reflecting no

logocentric tendency as it is in the West.
Secondly, Zhang Longxi has perhaps forgotten the fact that the metaphysical hierarchy is overturned if and only if writing is given priority
when both speech and writing are available. Rousseau's hierarchy of

speech over writing is deconstructed by Derrida because he "condemns
writing as destruction of presence and as disease of speech" (Of Grammatology 142), while he feels that he could take part in writing to hide himself,
his presence, "in order to make [himself] known in the ideality of truth
and value" (Of Grammatology 142). One should note, further, it is not
that Rousseau is ignorant enough to confuse the difference between
speech and writing that he himself has stipulated but that in trying to
retain or attain a "presence," Rousseau has to postulate a distinction
between what he calls "a good writing" and "a bad writing," the false
foundation of which Derrida has laid bare here. Because of this simulta-
neous access to both writing and speech and because of the degradation of
writing on one occasion and the valorization of it on the other, Derrida

explicates the implication of Rousseau's maneuver thus: "That is why,
straining toward the reconstruction of presence, [Rousseau] valorizes and
disqualifies writing at the same time. At the same time; that is to say, in
one divided but coherent movement" (Of Grammatology 141-42). As for

the Chinese writing system, it is apparently a different case. As the above
passage from the I Ching [The Book of Changes] that Zhang quotes indicates, this hierarchy of speech over writing could be traced back at least to
the Zhanguo period (c. 475-221 B.C.). If Chinese writing was emphasized in ancient times, it is perhaps not because it could convey a fuller or
better meaning than speech but simply because in the absence of a living
writer and hence of his speech, what one had to fall back upon was only
the writings that were left and supposed to be his. If anything, what
Zhang considers "the convention in ancient China of naming a book after
its author" (396) reveals not the power of Chinese writing over speech but
perhaps indirectly a deep-rooted myth of cherishing a "presence," that is,
taking the writing for the writer, a logocentric clinging to an authority, or
in Derridean term, to a "presence."
Related to Zhang Longxi's argument about Chinese writing is his explanation of what he deems the difference between "a deconstructive intertexte" and "a Chinese intertext," which I find problematic as well. As
Zhang puts it in his essay, "While a deconstructive intertexte is a trace

without origin, a Chinese intertext is always a trace leading back to the
origin, to the fountainhead of tradition, the great thinkers of Taoism and
Confucianism" (397). Here Zhang has perhaps made a comparison of

things that belong to different categories. If, as he remarks earlier and
rightly, there are "common and basic principles that underlie the two
great civilizations of the world [Chinese and Western]" in terms of verbal
communication, the Chinese language including Chinese writing is certainly susceptible to the category of "a deconstructive intertext," which
should be understood not so much as merely "a trace without origin" as an
open text that is subjected to various infiltrations, juxtapositions, or even
violence in the Derridean sense. On the other hand, if by origin is meant
an initiation of some discursive practices in the Foucaultian context, as

Zhang's argument seems to imply, then the "Chinese intertext . . . leading back to the origin" can also find its counterpart in some Western
texts: as Foucault points out, numerous or even infinite textual ramifications - explanations, translations, literary recreations - such as Joyce's
Ulysses can all be traced back to the Odyssey; and by the same token,
Homer, Aristotle, and the Church Fathers may also be deemed the fountainhead of "a theory, . . . of a tradition or a discipline within which new
books and authors can proliferate."24 Of the two categories of intertext
mixed up in Zhang Longxi's treatment of the subject, Barbara Johnson has
a quite succinct explication:
Contemporary discussions of intertextuality can be distinguished from "source" studies in that the latter speak in terms of a
transfer of property ("borrowing") while the former tend to speak
in terms of misreading or infiltration, that is, of violations of

property. Whether such violations occur in the oedipal rivalry
between a specific text and its precursor (Bloom's anxieties of
influence) or whether they inhere in the immersion of any text
in the history of its language and literature (Kristeva's paragrams,
Riffaterre's hypograms), "intertextuality" designates the multitude of ways a text has of not being self-contained, of being
traversed by otherness.25
Returning to Michelle Yen's comparison between Tao and Derrick's

diffrance, we can see that Yeh is apparently interested in the image of
"hinge" found in both Derrida and Chuang Tzu; for, as she puts it, "The
image of hinge [used in both texts] ... is more than a coincidence or
figure of speech. It leads to some significant similarities between diffrance
and Tao" (108). What is really meant by Derrida and Chuang Tzu? Are
there really any significant parallels in the use of the image here? Let us
follow Yeh's argument more closely.
In reference to a passage on the relativity of things in the Chuang Tzu,
Yeh speculates, "Like the hinge which, neither opens, nor closes, but
makes possible the opening and closing of the door, Tao exists in and as
the function by which unitary differences occur" (108). This is perhaps a
far-fetched interpretation of Chuang Tzu, given his original passage that
Yeh selects for analysis. For first of all, the Chinese character shu often
connotes figurative meanings of "key position" or "pivotal point," just as
in English "hinge" denotes "a determining factor" or "turning point."26

More specifically, in the passage that Yeh quotes, Chuang Tzu is plainly
expounding the human imposition of values upon the nature of things by
illustrating that the binary oppositions of right and wrong or of this and
that are all arbitrarily established and hence all relative to each other or
even one with one another (qi wu). This is the theme and purpose of the
chapter from which the passage is taken. It is in this sense that, as Chuang
Tzu writes, "[the sage] recognizes a 'this,' but a 'this' which is also a 'that,'
a 'that' which is also a 'this.' His 'that' has both a right and wrong in it; his
'this' too has both a right and wrong in it" (Watson 40). It follows for
Chuang Tzu that to erase the opposition of things is indeed a true way to
Tao, the key to Tao, or in the Master's own explicit explanation, "A state
in which 'this' and 'that' no longer find their opposites is called the hinge
of the Way [Tao]" (Watson 40). Yeh's argument about opening and
closing the door in regard to the image of hinge seems not well suited to
the text because she neglects the inherent meaning connections in the
whole passage in an effort to search merely for some surface parallels in
image.
If Yeh's explanation here does not quite fit Chuang Tzu's passage, what
about its connection with or application to deconstruction? To see "some
significant similarities between diffrance and Tao," as Yeh claims, it is
necessary to discuss Derrida's use of "hinge" in his text. His original word
la brisure is employed actually in its two opposing senses: break and joint
DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 3 1 1
(Of Grammatology 65). In the section under the heading "La Brisure,"
Derrida undertakes to discuss his notion of trace in the light of Saussure's
explanation of the differential nature of language. Starting from the princi-
ple of differentiation, Derrida goes on to quote Roman Jakobson as saying

"[the] form in language has a manifestly granular structure and is subject to
a quantal description," which therefore creates a "break," a "crack," or

"crevice" in the semantic train of trace (Of Grammatology 69). Yet on the
other hand, it is precisely this "break" that serves as a "joint" between
various differences in a trace, for, as Derrida reminds us, "in the

indecomposable synthesis of temporalization, protention is as indispensable as retention."27 Apparently, by using the notion of la brisure, Derrida
tries to hint at the simultaneous separation and connection of differences
in the temporalization of the meaning structure; his purpose is to show

"the impossibility that a sign, the unity of a signifier and a signified, [can]
be produced within the plenitude of a present and an absolute presence"

(Of Grammatology 69). To my mind, the English translation of la brisure
into "hinge" is somehow inadequate - that is perhaps why Spivak puts the
French original side by side with the English translation - because la

brisure in French emphasizes the sense of "break," which I think is the
more important aspect that Derrida wants to stress for the impossibility of
reaching a presence, whereas "hinge" in English tends to connote the

meaning of "joining." In any case, one can see that Derrida's use of la
brisure is far from Yen's explanation for the image of hinge in the Chuang
Tzu.
As mentioned before, the nature of Tao presupposes a whole and complete being or realm, , albeit a transcendental one. Invisible and untouchable as it is since it is transcendental, it is regarded by both Lao Tzu and
Chuang Tzu as an ultimate reality. Chuang Tzu describes it as " Complete
[?/iou],' 'all-embracing [fcian],' 'the whole [xian]'; these are different names
for the same reality, denoting the One" (Creel 31). Critical opinions may
differ on this score. Graham holds, for instance, that "Taoists are trying to
convey a knack, an aptitude, a way of living. . . . Taoists are not thinking of the Way [Tao] as ultimate Truth or Reality" (Disputers of the Tao
199). While I entirely agree with Graham that Taoists mainly offer "a way
of living" and I tend to think it possible that Taoist masters such as Lao
Tzu and Chuang Tzu might not have quite realized the ontological and
epistemological nature of their writings, Taoism as a discourse or philosophy can certainly be studied for its ontological concerns or the presupposi-
tions to be traced in the Tao Te Ching and the Chuang Tzu. As I see it, it
is their presupposition of a transcendental realm that becomes a fit subject
for deconstructive scrutiny. Graham himself comes closer to deconstruct
tion in his analysis of one of such Taoist presuppositions - Chuang Tzu's

notion of spontaneity.
What is "spontaneity," which is commonly regarded as the essence for
Taoism, at least for Chuang Tzu? If it implies a kind of mental or spiritual
status with which one acts or behaves as if devoid of any concentration,
motivation, or even attention, a pure mental status of one's being totally
merged with nature, it will perhaps be viewed by a Derridean as none

other than a myth or a cherished, fond dream that never comes true in the
real world. For to follow Derrida's opinion and argument for his deconstruction of the "transcendental signified" and metaphysics at large, one
might say that the behavior of a person living in reality is always already
governed or structured by various factors or forces. There can never and
will never be an ideal condition such as a pure spontaneity; there are

always degrees of premeditation, deliberation or intention, no matter how
slight they are, just as Graham asks shrewdly: "But with spontaneity the
question always arises of which kind is being recommended" (Disputers of
the Tao 191). On the other hand, one might argue that, taken properly,
spontaneity is spontaneity and there cannot be any kinds of spontaneity
just as there cannot be any kinds of perfection or ideality. If there are,

then the so-called "spontaneity" should cease to be "spontaneity" in the
first place. This is quite analogous to Derrida's critique of HusserPs concept of ideality in the latter's pursuit for a pure, ideal meaning. By examin-
ing Husserl's propositions of the iterability of truth on the one hand and
the necessary contamination in communication on the other, Derrida has
actually confronted Husserl with his own terms: no repetition is the same
as the thing to be repeated. If the repetition is, as Husserl regards it, the
"same" or an "ideal," it then ceases to be a repetition because it is no

longer a communication at all.28 Of course, Chuang Tzu's idea about
spontaneity is not to be compared with Husserl's ideality in its rigor; yet
they share the same dream of getting at something they take for granted,
i.e., spontaneity in mental aptitude for Chuang Tzu and ideality of mean-
ing for Husserl. In Derridean terms, then, Tao to Lao Tzu and Chuang
Tzu can be called perhaps none other than a "transcendental signified" or
an ultimate "presence." By performing some sort of "forgetting," then,

one can attain or at least imagine the "true status" or the "presence" of the
"ten thousand things" (wan wu) as Taoist sages do. Seen in this light, is
this Tao in its essential aspect comparable to Derrida's diffrance, despite
the superficialities in image or function one might detect between the

two?
Michelle Yeh discusses at great length the equivocation with which the
notion Tao plays on such Chinese terms as you (presence) and wu (absence). "Neither being nor nonbeing, neither presence nor absence, neither self-sameness nor difference," argues Yeh, "Tao is the originating
nonbeing always already preceding and underlying the polarities of being
and nonbeing, presence and absence, self-sameness and difference."29

Here Yeh perhaps confuses what she calls earlier in her essay the "nominalistic aspect of language" with the essential aspect of Tao at stake here.
Since Tao is unnameable, as Lao Tzu calls it, it is surely not to be referred
to as either of the terms in the pairs that Yeh herself enumerates. That,
however, does not prevent Tao from being conceived of, in the Lao Tzu
and the Chuang Tzu, as an ultimate "presence," a transcendental noumenon, unnameable though it is as we illustrated above.
Because of this confusion, Yeh's argument sounds more puzzling when
she asserts - all too arbitrarily - "Also like diffrance, Tao as origin must
be understood in a non-metaphysical, non-onto-theological sense, for

Tao," as she goes on to quote Lao Tzu, " 'gives birth yet does not own; it
accomplishes yet does not vaunt; it nourishes yet does not dominate* "
(109). Frankly, I do not quite see the connection between Lao Tzu's
quotation here and Yeh's explanation. Is it because Tao is unnameable
and seems to be outside of the binary distinction that it is free of the
metaphysical yoke? Or is it because Tao is, as Chuang Tzu puts it, the all-
elusive "One," the "complete," the "all-embracing," that it should not be

relegated to any human category such as "metaphysics" or "theology"?
This reminds me of Derrida's deconstruction of Heidegger's critique of
Western metaphysics; the latter's philosophy in certain ways bears a resem-
blence to Taoism. In fact, Heidegger was much attracted by Taoist

thought, particularly Lao Tzu's. Not only did he expound - brief as it
was - the idea of Tao in his own writings, but he also undertook to read
and translate parts of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching together with a Chinese
scholar.30 Derrida's critique of Heidegger, therefore, may in a sense illumi-
nate our comparison between deconstruction and Taoism.

Unlike Hegel, who pursues a historically developed absolute truth,
Heidegger tries to go back to the origin of Western metaphysics, to
discover Being (das Sein) instead of beings (die Seiende) that, as Heidegger
holds, all traditional Western philosophers have heretofore concerned

themselves with. To Heidegger, language is an impure medium for one to
search for Being because "Language speaks."31 Yet paradoxically one has
to avail oneself of language to understand the world. So he proposes to
take up a dialectic relation between "human speech" and the "speaking of
language," which contains what he calls a sort of "dif-ference," whereby
truth could be attained (208-09). His final proposal is therefore a poetic

silence or contemplation, through which Being or on to logical truths
could be intuited. This all too brief account here may not render
Heidegger full justice, a proper study of whom well deserves a separate
treatment; but one connection between Heidegger and Taoism is at least
made clear in that both still cherish a myth of a transcendental Being despite the fact that Heideger has disclaimed it - or an absolute Tao,
which is beyond doubt and which can be attained only through a mysterious contemplation or a sort of Joycean epiphany.
It is this belief in Being, this Heideggerian belief in the transcendence
over Western metaphysics, that Derrida takes issue with and deconstructs
with relentless rigor. "It remains that," argues Derrida, "the thinking of
Being, the thinking of the truth of Being, in the name of which Heidegger
delimits humanism and metaphysics, remains as thinking of man" (Mar-
gins of Philosophy 128, original emphasis). In other words, one cannot

escape the omnipresent sway of metaphysics however hard one tries to
"forget" it, as Chuang Tzu would say, in order to attain the realm of
freedom. To Derrida, the very perceptualization, let alone thinking, is
already permeated with metaphysics, is already intervened by the struc-
ture of diffrance. To claim a Taoist transcendence, if one can cite a

mundane example, is for a Derridean perhaps as self-deceptive as to declare that one can leave the earth by pulling up one's hair. It is in this
sense that Derrida emphasizes: "The thinking of the end of man, therefore, is always already prescribed in metaphysics, in the thinking of the
truth of man," simply because, as he goes on to explain, "absolute knowl-
edge and anthropology," "God and man," "onto-theo- teleology and humanism" can never be separated in a subject (Margins of Philosophy 121).
For Derrida, Tao is perhaps another manifestation of logocentrism and

hence is subject to deconstruction as well.
With Derrida's notion of diffrance in mind, Michelle Yeh is perhaps
not unaware of the potential incompatibility of Tao with deconstruction.
That is why she poses the question herself (113). Curiously enough, her
reply comes out negative because, as she explains, "in the complicity
between binary oppositions as a result of deconstruction the idea of one'
ness or equality is already implied" (113). For Yeh, since deconstruction

proposes diffrance, which operates in every text and everything - hence
they are all the same - this strategy turns out to be equivalent to the
Taoist suggestion of "equalizing everything." She argues that "the dissemination or doubling movement [Derrida] refers to is the oneness shared by
all texts, the way Tao is the oneness shared by all differences in nature or
'suchness' " (113). This may be an over-generalization, if one takes into

consideration what is really meant by Derrida's diffrance and Chuang
Tzu's "equalizing things." One can readily see for oneself that Derrida has
his eyes on the differential aspect of things; for him, nothing has its own
"presence" in human perception, to say nothing of anything being identical to anything else. By contrast, Chuang Tzu sees the identity of things
only; in his eyes, everything is the same as everything else because, to

quote Fung Yu-lan again, "They are equally from the Tao" (Short History
of Chinese Philosophy 113). While both are right for their assertions, their
different standpoints and foci should not go unnoticed, and their methodological difference should not be ignored, either.
Graham is more cautious in his approach to Taoism and deconstruction. As he observes:
The affinity of Lao-tzu and Derrida is that both use reversal to

deconstruct chains in which A is traditionally preferred to B, and
in breaking down the dichotomy offer us a glimpse of another line
which runs athwart it - for Lao-tzu the Way, for Derrida the
Trace. Both use a language which already escapes the opposition
logic/poetry', a language in which contradictory statements do not
cancel out, because if made in the appropriate sequence or combination they set you in the true direction. (Disputers of the Tao 227)
While the comparison is cogent and adequate in itself, it could be misleading if the real purposes of Lao Tzu's Taoism and Derrida's deconstruction
are not made explicit. For, after all, their reversals are of a different
nature. Lao Tzu is principally interested in the dialectic relations of, say,
weak and strong, which he derives from his empirical experiences of the
vicissitudes of things in nature. He offers a strategy especially well suited
to politics and warfare. As Graham correctly points out, "in preferring to

be submissive the sage does not cease to be oriented towards strength, for
he recognizes that surviving by yielding to a rising power is the road to
victory over it when its climax is past. Thus since everything which goes
up will come down, you may help to strengthen an enemy in order to

hasten the moment of his decline" (Disputers of the Too 228-29). Derrida's reversal, as illustrated earlier, is more of a philosophical or ontological concern in the sense that by laying bare the inconsistent logic or what
he occasionally calls the "kettle logic" or "a-logic" involved in various

binary hierarchies, he alerts people to the problematics of metaphysics
that have been taken for granted ever since Plato. Of course, Derrida also
talks a lot about "force," "politics," or "policing" in his philosophical

discourse, but these "forces," "politics" or "policing," it seems to me, aside
from their application to politics in their usual sense, may also have a lot
to do with the persistence, if I may use the word, of people to stick to

metaphysics and their resistance to the pull of a general economy, as
Derrida calls it. The common "resistance to theory" as Paul de Man labels
it and the antagonism to deconstruction are manifestations of such
"forces" or "policing" effects. All this is certainly different from Lao Tzu's
implications for his reversal.
I offer one more clarification for Graham's statement about Saussure's
linguistics. As Graham puts it, "In the hypostatising terminology of

Saussurian linguistics signifier and signified are two entities combined in
the sign, specifically compared to the two sides of a sheet of paper;

signifying has somehow disappeared, and for Derrida the object too has
dissolved into the signified ('There is nothing outside the text')" (Disputers of the Too 228). In Saussure's original, "signifier" and "signified" are
"significant" and "signifi" respectively. Properly speaking, "signifiant"
could be translated as "signifying" as well to denote what Graham deems
the signifying process. In fact it is precisely this signifying process implied
in the French word "signifiant" and yet not paid sufficient attention to by
Saussure that Derrida takes issue with in his Of Grammatology, as the

latter illustrates how temporality disrupts Saussure's attempt at establishing the synchronie signifying process. As for Derrida's well-known state-
ment quoted by Graham, his original is "II n'y a pas de hors-texte."32

"There is no outer-text," for which he surely does not deny the existence
of reality or object. It is only that one cannot conceive of reality or an

object without the aid or interference of various gestures including Ian-
guage; therefore, one's world is always already involved in one's language

or "text." It is better to hear what Derrida himself explains for the sentence:
That [sentence] does not mean that all referents are suspended,
denied, or enclosed in a book, as people have claimed, or have
been naive enough to believe and to have accused me of believing.
But it does mean that every referent, all reality has the structure of
a differential trace, and that one cannot refer to this "real" except in
an interpretive experience. The latter neither yields meaning nor

assumes it except in a movement of differential referring. That's
all. (Limited Inc. 148, emphasis mine)

III
Although our analysis of the comparisons between deconstruction and

Taoism turns out to be largely negative, the comparisons themselves and
the significance revealed by these comparisons should not be simply over-
looked. For in a sense, both Derrida and Chuang Tzu are engaged in the
same ontological and epistemological studies. Interestingly enough, facing the same problem of the linguistic barrier to human understanding,
Derrida displays rigorous reasoning - although often resorting to a deliberate playfulness to achieve his rigorous purpose - to analyze closely various
problems involved in our linguistic/philosophical phenomena, which is

typical of Western metaphysics and typical of Western scholarship. Taoists like Chuang Tzu, on the other hand, strike a different path by seeking
a certain mystical or Taoist transcendence beyond, if not circumvention
of, the whole problem, which is also typical of Chinese philosophy and
also more or less true of the Chinese way of learning, at least in ancient
times. This is perhaps best exemplified by an oft-quoted episode in

Chuang Tzu:
Duke Huan was in his hall reading a book. The wheel-wright
P'ien, who was in the yard below chiseling a wheel, laid down his
mallet and chisel, stepped up into the hall, and said to Duke
Huan, "This book Your Grace is reading - may I venture to ask
whose words are in it?" "The words of the sages," said the duke.
"Are the sages still alive?" "Dead long ago," said the duke. "In that
case, what you are reading there is nothing but the chaff and dregs
of the men of old!"
. . . [Asked his reason], Wheelwright P'ien said, "I look at it

from the point of view of my own work. When I chisel a wheel, if
the blows of the mallet are too gentle, the chisel slides and won't
take hold. But if they're too hard, it bites in and won't budge. Not
too gentle, not too hard - you can get it in your hand and feel it in
your mind. You can't put it into words, and yet there's a knack to
it somehow. I can't teach it to my son, and he can't learn it from
me. So I've gone along for seventy years and at my age I'm still
chiseling wheels. When the men of old died, they took with them
the things that couldn't be handed down. So what you are reading
there must be nothing but the chaff and dregs of the men of old."
(Watson 152-53)
Obviously, the moral of the story for Chuang Tzu is that, since the
essence of things can never be taught nor communicated, it is wise not
even to try to pursue it in a rigorous manner. Wheelwright P'ien advises
Duke Huan not to believe in the book, which, in his opinion, contains
nothing but "the chaff and dregs."
It is of course not the intention of this paper to pass a simple judgment
on the two methodologies representing two traditions as such. Yet the

analysis of the comparisons does serve to show that Derrida's is an active
attitude (itself part of a persistent engagement with a problem per se),

whereas the Taoist's seems an evasive one toward an issue (with its characteristic refusal to ratiocinative analysis). While Derrida tries to demarcate
the sphere of knowledge and then analyze what one can do within one's
capability - "There is nothing outside of the text" - Taoists like Chuang
Tzu deem it impossible, as the above story may help to illustrate, for
human reason to apprehend fully the ultimate truths, hence their transcendence over all human affairs including human knowledge.
To envision Taoists and Derrida in an imaginary encounter, then, one

might be tempted to ask, how can Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu truly attain
their claimed spontaneous realm to merge themselves with nature, from
the Derridean point of view? From the Taoist view-point, on the other
hand, how can Derrida justify the validity, even if relative, of his
"theory," since deconstruction is anchored on the discursive level, the
"text," which is not, as he himself is fully aware, the physical or phenome-
nal world per se? In other words, since the "interpretive experience" is
arbitrarily established by men without empirical anchorage or validity,
how and on what grounds can deconstruction critique the others for their
metaphysical problematics or inconsistency by basing itself nevertheless
on the very same metaphysics? We are here back to GdePs theorem and
this seems an irresolvable paradox for deconstruction itself. 33
And last but not least, the studies analyzed above perhaps also show the
complexity of a comparative study that engages diverse cultural traditions.
Excessive stress on certain similarities in imagery or hasty generalizations
of intricate concepts may prove counterproductive or even misleading

because they ignore some fundamental differences, differences which are
rooted in disparate cultural traditions which set deconstruction and Tao'

ism apart. Whether the similarities identified are significant or not, to
remain aware of essential differences beneath the surface parallels seems
to me more candid, more timely, and perhaps also more beneficial to the
Eastern mind.34
University of California, Los Angeles
NOTES
1. Except for such terms or names as Tao, Taoism, Lao Tzu, and Chuang Tzu, which
have already been known in the West, I will follow the pinyin system for romanizing
Chinese characters in the text.
2. Ye Xiushan, "Yiyi shijie de maizang: ping yinhui zhexuejia delida" [Burial of the
World of Meaning: On Derrida, a Philosopher of Obscurity] Zhongguo shehui kexue [Chinese
Social Sciences] 3 (1989): 104 (my translation); and Donald Wesling, "Methodological
Implications of the Philosophy of Jacques Derrida for Comparative Literature: The Opposi'
tion East- West and Several Other Observations," Chinese-Western Comparative Literature:
Theory and Strategy, ed. John J. Deeney (Hong Kong: Chinese UP, 1980) 79 and 104.
3. Zhang Longxi, "The Tao and the Logos," Critical Inquiry 11 (1985): 397.
4. Michelle Yeh, "Deconstructive Way: A Comparative Study of Derrida and Chuang
Tzu "Journal of Chinese Philosophy 10 (1983): 95-126.
5. A. C. Graham, Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Argument in Ancient China (La
Salle, IL: Open Court, 1989) 227.
6. Jacques Derrida, Positions, trans. Alan Bass (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1981) 51
(original emphasis).
7. Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. G. C. Spivak (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
UP, 1976). See generally, OfGrammatobgy, Part II.
8. Jacques Derrick, Dissemination, trans. Barbara Johnson (Chicago: U of Chicago P,

1981) 220.
9. See Ernest Nagel and James R. Newman, GoaeVs Proof (New York: New York UP,
1973) 7 and 98-102.
10. Jacques Derrida, The Post Card: From Socrates to Freud and Beyond, trans. Alan bass
(Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1987) 417.

11. Cheng Zhao-xiong, Daojia sixiang [Taoist Thought] (Taipei: Ming wen, 1985) 12
(my translation).
12. Fung Yu-lan, The Spirit of Chinese Philosophy, trans. E. R. Hughes (London: Kegan
Paul, Trench, Triibner, 1947) 79.

13. Burton Watson, trans., The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu (New York: Columbia
UP, 1968) 43.
14. A. C. Graham, trans., Chuang Tzu: The Seven Inner Chapters and Other writings
from the Book of Chuang Tzu (London: Allen & Unwin, 1981) 100.
15. Fung Yu-lan, A Short History of Chinese Phibsophy, ed. Derk Bodde (New York:
Macmillan, 1948) 113.
16. Benjamin Schwartz, The World of Thought in Ancient China (Cambridge, MA: Har-
vard UP, 1985)219.
17. Fang Dong-mei, Yuanshi rujia daojia zhexue [Original Confucian and Taoist Philosophies] (Taipei: Dawn Culture, 1983) 244 (my translation).
18. Jacques Derrida, Limited Inc., trans. Samuel Weber and Jeffrey Mehlman (Evanston,
IL: Northwestern UP, 1988) 146.

19. See, for example, Herrlee G. Creel, What is Taoism? (Chicago: U of Chicago P,
1970) 2-3.
20. Joseph Needham, Science and Civilization in China, 6 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge
UP, 1956) 2: 37.
2 1 . Jacques Derrida, Margins of Philosophy, trans. Alan Bass (Chicago: U of Chicago P,
1982) 3 and 5.
22. Ren Jiyu, trans. , Laozi xinyi [A New Translation of Lao Tzu] (Shanghai: Guji, 1985)
ch. 21.
23. Zhang 394; this is Zhang Longxi's quotation from the Appendixes to I Ching [The
Book of Changes], Recently different interpretations have appeared for the passage. Wang
Zhongling, for instance, explains that 'The meaning of shubujin y an is no more than that
books cannot put all words into writing (because of limits of space). Then, the meaning of
yan bujin yi is no more than that words cannot speak of all meanings in one's mind (because
of the limits of time and purpose)"; qtd. in James Liu, Language-Paradox-Poetics: A Chinese
Perspective (Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1988) 27. If Wang's interpretation is plausible, it
may indeed effectively explain the absence of phonocentrism in ancient China; on the
other hand, it may also indicate a more profound logocentrism, a "presence" that can be
reached by language in the form of speech or writing.
24. See Michel Foucault, "What Is an Author?" and "The Discourse on Language,"
Critical Theory Since 1965, ed. Hazard Adams and Leroy Searle (Tallahassee: Florida State
UP, 1986) 145 and 152.
25. Barbara Johnson, "Les Fleurs du mal arm: Some Reflections on Intertextuality,"
Lyric Poetry Beyond New Criticism, ed. Chaviva Hosek and Patricia Parker (Ithaca, NY:
Cornell UP, 1985) 264.
26. Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary (Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam, 1974).
27. OfGrammatology 66; there is a case of mistranslation or more probably a typographical error here, for the word "protection" should read "protention." "Protention" had the
same form in French and English, and indicates the philosophical notion of the expansion
of time in its continuum.
28. See Jacques Derrida, Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays on Husserl's Theory of
Signs, trans. David B. Allison (Evanston, IL: Northwestern UP, 1973), chs. 3, 5, and 6.
29. Yeh 110; here the notions of "presence" and "absence" represented by the Chinese
characters you and um should not be confused with the rigorous deconstructive terms
"presence" and "absence." In the context of the Too Te Ching and the Chuang Tzu, you and
wu are, in my view, more akin to "being" and "nonbeing."
30. See Graham Parkes, d., Heidegger and Asian Thought (Honolulu: U of Hawaii P,
1987) 93-103.
3 1 . Martin Heidegger, Poetry, Language, Thought, trans. Albert Hofstadter (New York:
Harper & Row, 1971) 190.

32. Jacques Derrida, De la grammatologie (Paris: Minuit, 1967) 97.
33. Derrida is himself aware of the problem when he talks about wishing to "reach a
point of certain exteriority in relation to the totality of the age of logocentrism," which is
an immense topic that cannot be dealt with in this paper. Interested readers may consult
the section entitled "The Exorbitant: Question of Method" in Of Grammatology.
34. This paper has grown out of my participation in seminars by the late Professor Joseph
Riddel and Professors Richard Strassberg, Peggy Kamuf, and Samuel Weber, to all of whom
I am deeply indebted. I would also like to thank Professor Vincent Pecora for his encourage-
ment and suggestions, and I am especially grateful to Professor Jacques Derrida for his
reading of an early version of this paper and for his clarification of some concepts and issues
concerning deconstruction.

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Deconstruction and Taoism: Comparisons Reconsidered

Deconstruction and Taoism: Comparisons

Since Derrida launched a wholesale dismantling of Western metaphysics

of hand, the strategy of deconstruction."3 To him, "Tao" was obviously

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES, Vol. 29, No. 3, 1992.

DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 297

stration? Was "Tao" self-deconstructed or was the Chinese hierarchy of

me to embark on a comparative study of deconstruction and Taoism by

use of the terms.

ful revaluation of the system of traditional thinking"(95). "The common

on and that it carries on."6 By metaphysics Derrida here means more

298 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

are overturned by themselves. It is obvious but nevertheless significant

Such reversion of the traditional hierarchies is possible and necessary

ment" is neither the outside of an inferiority nor a complement of the

ings of those terms undecidables or paradoxes. In analyzing the word

DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 299

that has produced inside it two contradictory layers of signification

(continuity and discontinuity, inside and outside, identity and

praxis required by the same context, opposed or rejected or replaced by

us of GdePs Incompleteness Theorem, which Derrida takes notice of in

able proposition, as Gdel demonstrated in 1931, is a proposition

an analytical nor deductive consequence of those axioms, nor in

axioms. (Dissemination 219, original emphasis)

the field of mathematical logic really understand the details of GdePs

teed. In other words, a full description or understanding of a formalistic

300 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

In "Plato's Pharmacy," for instance, Derrida analyzes the structure un-

derlying a mythological god (Thoth) told in different cultures, and he

is therefore secondary to all other characteristics - father, life, speech,

his father, his son, and himself (Dissemination 93).

with Freud's psychoanalysis of the Oedipus myth and of Hans Christian

that actually both stories have already contained Freud's analysis, or

DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 301

edged by Freud more than once)? And especially when the

phering? (The Post Card 414, original emphasis).

means available - of language, how is it possible that such a "fact" or

of the ubiquitous metaphysics or to ignore the complications arising out of

302 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

more recent efforts have been mainly directed at the problematization of

Let us return to our comparative topic. The above sketch of Derrida's

tics of Taoism, if by tradition and convention are meant the Confucian

teousness]."12 But sheer unconventionality or anti-traditionality alone

atic area in this regard is the binary oppositions embedded in language"

vs. uselessness, or large vs. small. In his discourse on the relativity of

There is a beginning. There is a not yet beginning to be a

to be a beginning. There is being. There is nonbeing. There is a

DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 303

Said Hui Shih to Chuang Tzu:

It is obvious that by these parables Chuang Tzu tries to show the

depends on "that" - which is to say that "this" and "that" give

all in the light of Heaven. He too recognizes a "this," but a "this"

304 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE STUDIES

Fung Yu-lan, in commenting on Chuang Tzu's point of view, explains:

rejection, then, there is no distinction but only undifferentiation left

ity."17 Starting from seeing through the relative nature in everything,

of 'all or nothing' choice between pure realization of self-presence and

DECONSTRUCTION AND TAOISM 305

complete freeplay or undecidability" (Limited Inc. 115). All he tries to do

is to point out certain inherently unresolvable problems inhabiting the

If I understand Derrida correctly, while he considers it very important

tions of force that are always differential - for example, socio-political'

stable, sometimes apparently almost unshakable, it should be possible to