ABSTRACT
From about 1980 Baudrillard’s writing changed significantly. He no longer claimed to represent the direction the world is moving in, as he had throughout the 1970s. From this point his writing claimed only to challenge and to defy, to cipher and render enigmatic (1996c: 94-105). Because there is no ‘real’ world to represent and no stable subject position from which to claim to represent the real, writing theory becomes, for Baudrillard, an act, a gesture and a symbolic relation. Baudrillard’s writing gives in order to challenge, to provoke or to force a response. And Baudrillard succeeded in forcing many responses – from outrage and incredulity to incomprehension – but he also established a following. Baudrillard’s later theory sets up a symbolic relation between text and readers, and between writing and the world (not the ‘real’ world but
the illusion of the world). His writing challenges ‘banal illusion’ and is an affirmation of ‘vital illusion’ (2000: 59-83). This chapter explores what Baudrillard meant by vital illusion, by a symbolic relation between writing and the world and the possibilities for a radical, postcritical theory that this relation suggests.
