“The Music of Being”: a note on a metaphor from Giorgio Agamben’s last volume of <i>Homo Sacer</i>.

Abstract

The article attempts to clarify the place and meaning of musical-acoustic metaphors that appear in the last volume of Homo Sacer, The Use of Bodies, in connection with the project of modal ontology. The definition of philosophy as the “supreme music,” increasingly common in the pages of his later texts, suggests that this is not just a figurative meaning of musical images but an attempt to give them conceptual weight. To clarify the musical basis of philosophy, the article offers an analysis of a number of statements from The Use of Bodies in the context of Agamben’s early reflections on language and voice (most notably in Language and Death). The analysis allows us to show that musical metaphors mark the direction of Agamben’s positive program, particularly the project of modal ontology, which seeks to resolve the aporia of the ontological apparatus thattraces back to Aristotle. Although the aim of the article is mainly technical — to fit only apparently incidental musical metaphors into the logic of Agamben’s entire philosophical project — it seems that this analysis may be useful in clarifying the basis for understanding and critiquing the thought of the Italian philosopher.