{"product_id":"demon-of-writing-the","title":"Demon Of Writing The","description":"\u003cp\u003eSince the middle of the eighteenth century, political thinkers of all kinds — radical and reactionary, professional and amateur — have been complaining about “bureaucracy.” But what, exactly, is all this complaining about?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe Demon of Writing\u003c\/i\u003e is a critical history and theory of one of the most ubiquitous, least understood forms of media: paperwork. States rely on records to tax and spend, protect and serve, discipline and punish. But time and again this paperwork proves to be unreliable. Examining episodes from the story of a clerk who lost his job and then his mind in the French Revolution to Roland Barthes’s brief stint as a university administrator, the book reveals the powers, failures, and even pleasures of paperwork. Many of its complexities, the book argues, have been obscured by the comic-paranoid style that characterizes so many of our criticisms of bureaucracy. At the same time, the book outlines a new theory of what Marx called the “bureaucratic medium.” Returning first to Marx, then to Freud, \u003ci\u003eThe Demon of Writing\u003c\/i\u003e argues that this theory of paperwork must be attentive to both praxis and parapraxis.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"MediaPlace","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57408063471998,"sku":"NW9781942130352","price":17.29,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1379\/1261\/files\/9781942130352.jpg?v=1778681978","url":"https:\/\/mediaplace.com\/products\/demon-of-writing-the","provider":"MediaPlace","version":"1.0","type":"link"}