The Frenchmen: Or, My Life in Theory by Emily Eakin Buy on BookshopEakin’s Frenchmen are an eclectic group, differing in interests, politics, and methods. They wrote on topics as varied as schizophrenia, prison architecture, photography, Edgar Allan Poe, and (in Barthes’s case) their mom. “Deconstruction,” an analytical method developed by Derrida, came to define French theory and is at the heart of Eakin’s book. Is it really necessary to think about a “life in theory” as an opposition on the verge of collapse? If theory is truly as illuminating as Eakin argues, there ought to be a less reductive, less formulaic way to bring it to life.