11e

“It is great temptation to want to make the spirit explicit [denGeist explicit machen zu wollen].”

But the spirit is precisely the name given to that which subtends and informs the explicit, i.e., that which is made visible. Eg, we might say these particular gestures express a person’s spirit. But the spirit itself could never be co-extensive with a gesture. Spirit is always ‘in reserve’.

(One of Zizek’s speculations about post-modernism: its obsession with ‘making explicit’ that which ordinarily is held in reserve.)

Q: On expression: ok, that which is ‘expressed’ is never exhausted in its ‘expression’. If it were synonymous with its expression, what would that be? Theatrical. (eg, theatrical anger is synonymous with its expression.)