Professor Simon Wortham

About

After completing my DPhil at the University of Sussex in 1993, my research has concentrated on the connections between continental philosophy, literary theory and a variety of political and psychoanalytic texts. I have published books on the philosophical question of the university institution; on the question of sleep as a complex and surprisingly persistent topic within the history of philosophy; on the European philosophical tradition's relationship to problems of pain and suffering; on the complicated interplay between psychoanalytic and political ideas of resistance; and on the writings of Jacques Derrida. My most recent academic monograph explores the legacy of philosophical discourses of optimism and pessimism in order to assess the limits and possibilities of contemporary political hope.  I have also written a trilogy of novels published by Ma Bibliotheque, the first appearing in 2020. Current projects include a critical life of Robert Walser and a fictional account of Walser's correspondence with Frieda Mermet. While at Kingston I have supervised PhDs on topics as varied as psychoanalysis, trauma and creative writing; resistance, revolution and fascism; Kantianism and speculative realism; and deconstruction and performativity.

Academic responsibilities

Pro Vice-Chancellor Research, Kingston University

Qualifications

  • DPhil, Sussex University
  • MA Critical Theory, Sussex University
  • BA English Literature, Sussex University

Research

Close Advisory Board, Textual Practice

Advisory Board, New Formations

Editorial Board, Derrida Today

Member of the AHRC Peer Review College, 2022-25

Research student supervision

Publications

Number of items: 62.

Article

Wortham, Simon (2023) Walser on Walser. Minor Literature[s],

Wortham, Simon (2022) Caught on the hop : politico-philosophical writing of the 'leap'. Paragraph, 45(3), pp. 316-335. ISSN (print) 0264-8334

Wortham, Simon (2022) To give the differend its due : damages/distress. Philosophy Today, 66(2), pp. 307-326. ISSN (print) 0031-8256

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2017) Antinomies of the super-ego : Etienne Balibar and the question of the psycho-political. Philosophy Today, 61(4), pp. 863-876. ISSN (print) 0031-8256

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2016) Fleeced. Paragraph, 39(2), pp. 149-164. ISSN (print) 0264-8334

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2014) Joking apart. The Oxford Literary Review, 36(2), pp. 274-276. ISSN (print) 0305-1498

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2014) The pig's head. Book review of: 'Prolegomena to any future materialism, Volume 1: The outcome of contemporary French philosophy' by Adrian Johnston. Radical philosophy(187), pp. 52-54. ISSN (print) 0300-211X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) Survival of cruelty. The Southern Journal of Philosophy, 51(S1), pp. 126-141. ISSN (print) 0038-4283

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) Time of debt: on the Nietzschean origins of Lazzarato's indebted man. Radical philosophy(180), pp. 35-43. ISSN (print) 0300-211X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) What we owe to retroactivity: the origin and future of debt. Postmodern Culture, 23(3), ISSN (online) 1053-1920

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) Afterword: Impossible Divisions. SAQ: South Atlantic Quarterly, 112(1), pp. 163-170. ISSN (print) 0038-2876

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2012) L'Arret de mort, insomnia, dreaming, sleep: Derrida, Blanchot, Levinas. Derrida Today, 5(1), pp. 111-139. ISSN (print) 1754-8500

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2011) 'By force of love ... something should happen to God, and someone happen to him': the other's other(s) in Derrida. Textual Practice, 25(6), pp. 1051-1073. ISSN (print) 0950-236X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2011) Resistances - after Derrida after Freud. Mosaic: a journal for the interdisciplinary study of literature, 44(4), pp. 51-61. ISSN (print) 0027-1276

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2011) Infant criticism: Agamben's potential. Paragraph, 34(1), pp. 137-151. ISSN (print) 0264-8334

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2011) The chance of thinking - conjurations. Parallax, 17(1), pp. 65-77. ISSN (print) 1353-4645

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2010) "The discipline of the question": rereading Derrida's "Violence and metaphysics". Derrida Today, 3(1), pp. 137-150. ISSN (print) 1754-8500

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2009) Anonymity writing pedagogy: Beckett, Descartes, Derrida. Symploke, 16(1-2), pp. 93-105. ISSN (print) 1069-0697

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2007) Law of friendship: Agamben and Derrida. New Formations, 62, pp. 89-105. ISSN (print) 0950-2378

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2007) Counter introduction. Textual Practice, 21(2), pp. 213-229. ISSN (print) 0950-236X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) 'The fidelity of a guardian': the 'double keeping' of Jacques Derrida. Parallax, 12(3), pp. 85-98. ISSN (print) 1353-4645

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) Unheard of. Textual Practice, 20(1), pp. 121-140. ISSN (print) 0950-236X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2004) Auditing Derrida. Parallax, 10(2), pp. 3-18. ISSN (print) 1353-4645

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2004) Obsessional writing. Textual Practice, 18(1), pp. 47-63. ISSN (print) 0950-236X

Morgan Wortham, Simon and Fynsk, Christopher (2004) The claim of the humanities: a dialogue between Simon Morgan Wortham and Christopher Fynsk. Culture Machine, ISSN (print) 1743-6176

Wortham, Simon (2001) "To come walking": reinterpreting the institution and the work of Samuel Weber. Cultural Critique: an international journal of cultural studies, 48(1), pp. 164-199. ISSN (print) 0882-4371

Wortham, Simon (1999) Van Gogh's shoes, or, does the university have two left feet? Culture Machine, 1, ISSN (online) 1465-4121

Wortham, Simon (1998) Surviving theory, “as if I[t] were dead”: Derrida and interdisciplinarity. New Formations: a journal of culture, theory & politics, 34, pp. 152-166. ISSN (print) 0950-2378

Wortham, Simon (1997) Bringing criticism to account: economy, exchange and cultural theory. Economy and Society, 26(3), pp. 400-418. ISSN (print) 0308-5147

Wortham, Simon (1997) Multiple submissions and little scrolls of parchment: censorship, knowledge, and the academy. New Literary History, 28(3), pp. 501-523. ISSN (print) 0028-6087

Wortham, Simon (1996) Sovereign counterfeits: the trial of the Pyx. Renaissance Quarterly, 49(2), pp. 334-359. ISSN (print) 0034-4338

Wortham, Simon (1996) The Glasse of majesty: reflections on new historicism and cultural materialism. Angelaki, 2(2), pp. 47-57. ISSN (print) 0969-725X

Book

Wortham, Simon (2022) Berlin W, or, méssalliance : posthumous fragments. London, U.K. : Ma Bibliothèque. 108p. ISBN 9781910055946

Wortham, Simon (2021) Early mass : a novel by Peter Müller. London, U.K. : Ma Bibliothèque. 120p. ISBN 9781910055892

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2020) The Small. London, U.K. : Ma Bibliothèque. 240p. ISBN 9781910055700

Wortham, Simon (2019) Hope : the politics of optimism. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury Academic. 192p. ISBN 9781350105294

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2017) Resistance and psychoanalysis : impossible divisions. Edinburgh, U.K. : Edinburgh University Press. 288p. ISBN 9781474429610

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2017) Samuel Weber : acts of reading. Abingdon, U.K. : Routledge. 164p. (Routledge revivals) ISBN 9781138709195

Morgan Wortham, Simon and Alfano, Chiara, eds. (2016) Desire in ashes: deconstruction, psychoanalysis, philosophy. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury Academic. 190p. (Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy) ISBN 9781472529138

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2014) Modern Thought in Pain: Philosophy, Politics, Psychoanalysis. Edinburgh, U.K. : Edinburgh University Press. 168p. (Frontiers of Theory) ISBN 9780748692415

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) The poetics of sleep: from Aristotle to Nancy. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury. 192p. ISBN 9781441124760

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2010) The Derrida Dictionary. London, U.K. : Continuum. 272p. (Continuum Philosophy Dictionaries) ISBN 9781847065261

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2008) Derrida: writing events. London, U.K. : Continuum. 145p. (Continuum studies in philosophy) ISBN 9781847062475

Weiner, Allison and Morgan Wortham, Simon, eds. (2007) Encountering Derrida: legacies and futures of deconstruction. London : Continuum. 215p. (Continuum studies in continental philosophy) ISBN 9780826498939

Morgan Wortham, Simon and Hall, Gary, eds. (2007) Experimenting: essays with Samuel Weber. New York : Fordham University Press. 274p. ISBN 9780823228157

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) Counter-institutions: Jacques Derrida and the question of the university. New York : Fordham University Press. 164p. (Perspectives in continental philosophy, 55) ISSN (print) 1089-3938 ISBN 9780823226665

Wortham, Simon (1999) Rethinking the university: leverage and deconstruction. Manchester, U.K. : Manchester University Press. 179p. ISBN 0719056292

Book Section

Wortham, Simon (2023) Deconstructing debt : Derrida, Nietzsche and twenty-first century retroactivity. In: Tinguely, Joseph, (ed.) The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Money : Volume 2 : Modern Thought. Palgrave Macmillan. (In Press)

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2019) Critiquing poststructuralism : the recent politics of French thought. In: Goh, Irving, (ed.) French Thought and Literary Theory in the UK. New York, NY : Routledge. pp. 111-130. ISBN 9780367408220

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2018) Deconstruction : politics, ethics, aesthetics. In: Stocker, Barry and Mack, Michael, (eds.) The Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Literature. London : Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 407-425. ISBN 9781137547934

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2016) 'There shall be no mourning'. In: Morgan Wortham, Simon and Alfano, Chiara, (eds.) Desire in ashes: deconstruction, psychoanalysis, philosophy. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury Academic. pp. 43-71. (Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy) ISBN 9781472529138

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2014) The Archive, The Event, and the Impression. In: Mays, Sas, (ed.) Libraries, Literatures, and Archives. London, U.K. : Routledge. pp. 185-201. (Routledge Studies in Library and Information Science) ISBN 9780415843874

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2013) Archive-Abilities. In: Senatore, Mauro, (ed.) Performatives After Deconstruction. London, U.K. : Bloomsbury Academic. (Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy) ISBN 9781441123466

Morgan Wortham, Simon and Hall, Gary (2007) Introduction: experimenting. In: Morgan Wortham, Simon and Hall, Gary, (eds.) Experimenting: essays with Samuel Weber. New York : Fordham University Press. pp. 1-12. ISBN 9780823228157

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2007) Of debts, dreams and jokes: or, Weberian theatricality. In: Morgan Wortham, Simon and Hall, Gary, (eds.) Experimenting: essays with Samuel Weber. New York : Fordham University Press. pp. 44-84. ISBN 9780823228157

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) Deconstruction (1966). In: Clark, Robert, (ed.) The literary encyclopedia. Norwich, U.K. : The Literary Dictionary Company Limited. ISSN (online) 1747-678X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) Giorgio Agamben (1942-). In: Clark, Robert, (ed.) The literary encyclopedia. Norwich, U.K. : The Literary Dictionary Company Limited. ISSN (online) 1747-678X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2006) The event. In: Clark, Robert, (ed.) The literary encyclopedia. Norwich, U.K. : The Literary Dictionary Company Limited. ISSN (online) 1747-678X

Morgan Wortham, Simon (2004) Anthologizing Derrida. In: Di Leo, Jeffrey R., (ed.) On anthologies: politics and pedagogy. Lincoln, U.S. : University of Nebraska Press. pp. 326-341. ISBN 0803266448

Wortham, Simon (2002) Censorship and the institution of knowledge in Bacon's New Atlantis. In: Price, Bronwen, (ed.) Francis Bacon's New Atlantis: new interdisciplinary essays. Manchester : Manchester University Press. pp. 180-198. (Texts in culture) ISBN 0719060524

Wortham, Simon (2002) "Pairt of my taill is yet untolde": James VI and I, the pheonix, and the royal gift. In: Fischlin, Daniel and Fortier, Mark, (eds.) Royal subjects: essays on the writings of James VI and I. Detroit, U.S. : Wayne State University Press. pp. 182-204. ISBN 0814328776

Database or Web Resource

Wortham, Simon (2021) Derrida, Jacques (1930-2004). Bloomsbury Philosophy Library.

This list was generated on Wed Sep 27 06:46:46 2023 BST.