Inédits 4 (1966–1990): De la sémiologie à la sémiotique. Choix de lettres d’A. J. Greimas

Abstract

AbstractAs of his undergraduate days in Grenoble if not before, and up to 1992, Greimas maintained an ample and regular correspondence, notably with family, friends, collaborators, and students. In 1990, he told a compatriot that he mailed about thirty letters a week (Greimas, letter to Aleksandra Kašuba, 4 Sept. 1990, in Greimas and Kašuba (2008: 183)) – and he undoubtedly received as many. A number of correspondents saved his missives, sometimes along with a draft or carbon copy of their letters to him. Public and private collections hold a small portion of these exchanges, and a number of individuals have published a selection of his correspondence. Unfortunately, for his part, Greimas later burned most of the letters in French that he had received, as well as communications from family members. As he explained to Louis-Jean Calvet around 1988, “I was in the process of burning my correspondence. It’s the end of bringing everything to an end.” (Greimas, interviewed by Louis-Jean Calvet, ca. 1988, two cassette tapes.) On the other hand, Greimas did keep certain letters of intellectual or historical interest that he received from Lithuanians. He even edited the letters that the poet Henrikas Radauskas had sent him, which came out as an article in 1993 (see Greimas (1993) in the bibliography), and agreed with Aleksandra Kašuba to save the entirety of their epistolary exchanges for publication in book form, a project realized in 2008. Below, the reader will find a tiny sample of letters that Greimas sent colleagues.