Helene Cixous is Professor of Literature at the Universite de Paris VIII. Susan Sellers, the editor, is Professor of English and Related Literature at the University of St Andrews.

Acknowledgments Editor's note Preface: On being interviewed Part I: Writing the enigma 1. The play of fiction 2. The novel today 3. Literature suspends death 4. In the beginnings, there were many Part II: Writing the feminine 5. When I do not write, it is as if I had died 6. My text is written in white and black, in milk and nightA" Part III: Writing and politics 7. Guardian of language 8. Against the emotion of history Part IV: Writing and theatre 9. The author between text and theatre Part V: Writing roots 10. Language is the only refuge 11. Being a Jewish woman is the ideal place Part VI: On painting, music and nature 12. You race towards that secret, which escapes 13. We must hand our inheritance on Part VII: Dialogues 14. On Marguerite Duras, with Michel Foucault 15. From the word to life, with Jacques Derrida Envoi: But the Earth still turns, and not as badly as all that Bibliography of Helene Cixous's works Index