The Work of Interpretation: "Critique" and the Review Form, 1946–1967

This article examines a series of pivotal moments in the history of the postwar French journal 'Critique', tracing the development, refinement, and reas- sertion of the journal’s singular style of critical practice. We present the journal’s founding documents and consider editor Georges Bataille’s identification of Maurice Blanchot as the guiding model for the journal. Then we examine two defining texts in the review’s development: Alexandre Kojève’s “Hegel, Marx and Christianity” (1946) and Alain Badiou’s “The (Re)commencement of Dia- lectical Materialism” (1967). Kojève’s celebrated article crystallised the ideals of the journal’s programme; Badiou’s article meanwhile tested those ideals, precipitating a minor editorial crisis.