This volume uses a broad spectrum of philosophers and writers -- Blanchot, Levinas, Derrida, Joyce, Deleuze, Acker, Wordsworth, Adorno, Nancy, and many others -- to pursue its theme: the future of literary studies depends on an understanding of aesthetics both as an outcome of its cultural context and a questioning of that very context. In the editors' words, even as literature "submits itself to cultural critiques, it keeps interrogating the very ideas of culture and critique". In their interpretation of literature as interdiscursive, the editors and contributors open a line of argument that is important for the future of literary studies. The essays aim to break the boundaries separating philosophy and literature, to let each reform in a way that reveals the relationships between them.