André S. Labarthe's Treatise on the Glass: A New Cogito

André S. Labarthe's 'Traité du verre' (Treatise on the Glass), published by LimeLight Éditions, is a slim volume of about fifty pages that uses the breaking of drinking glasses as a metaphor for time and reality. Labarthe, a filmmaker known for his unclassifiable works, opens with a quote from Georges Bataille: '...all reality breaks, is cracked...' He argues that reality, like a glass on the edge of a table, is constantly threatened by disaster, and that its truth is revealed only in the moment of catastrophe. Labarthe describes the instant of breakage as 'imprévisible' (unforeseeable) and 'miracle' (miraculous), in the etymological sense of astonishing and stunning. He contrasts the 'miracle' cinema of Roberto Rossellini with the 'mastery' of Alfred Hitchcock, whom he calls an 'impostor and genius'. Labarthe's method is encapsulated in his Cartesian twist: 'Je me brise donc je suis' (I break therefore I am). The book's chapters include 'Menace', 'Éjaculations précoces', and 'Femmes nues (ou pires)'. Labarthe references Baudelaire and Apollinaire, and concludes that breaking a glass is a defiance of the Law and a challenge to the Real, which he calls 'l'insupportable' (the unbearable). The review is written by Jacques Henric for artpress.