Geschichte einer lebenslanger Beziehung, aus der Sicht des Philosophes der an seine kranke Frau, seine Unterstützerin und Freundin schreibt. Die Verbindung zwischen den beiden hat sich über die Jahre so entwickelt und verstärkt, da war eine einseitige Fortsetzung gar nicht denkbar. Als einzige Möglichkeit bot sich eine gemeinsame Beendigung des Lebens, und diesen Weg sind sie dann auch konsequent gegangen. ( )

Letter to D. A love letter is a love letter. D. is Dorine, the loving partner, wife, of A., André. It is not a romantic love letter between young lovers, but a meditation on 58 years of marriage.

André Gorz (1923 – 2007) was a prominent French intellectual, a social philosopher, and journalist, founder of Le Nouvel Observateur in 1964.

In 2007, André and Dorine Gorz commited suicide. She was aged 82, he was 84 years old. They could not bear the idea that one of them would pass away first, leaving the other behind, alone.

Letter to D. A love letter reads like a short biography. In this ego document, Gorz looks back on the 60 years they spent together, from getting to know each other, to courtship, and a loving marriage that lasted for 58 years. They look back, mostly on the career of André Gorz, focussing on the high-lights. The booklet describes how they did things together, the key people they met and which important decisions they made in their lives.

It is not a political or scientific testament, although the emphasis on the technocriticism and ecology as the outcomes of their career, seems to give the book more significance, as if offereing the readers a suggestion or consideration for the future.

The English translation of Letter to D. A love letter is published with an afterword by the translator, Julie Rose, and "Notes for the Reader" listing all major personae listed in the book with a brief biography and main publications. Besides some of the most obvious, such as Sartre, Blanchot, Camus, De Beauvoir, Giles Deleuze, Marcuse, Merleau-Ponty, lLévi-Strauss and Benny Lévy, who played an important role in the formation and early philosophy of Gorz, there are references to robert laponche, Ivan Illich, Pierre-Félix Guattari, Jean Jaurès, Jacques Ellul, Günther Anders and Charles Apothéloz, who were key figures in his development towards a new future for political economy and political ecology.

Rather than a short biography or synopsis of a life, Letter to D. A love letter can be read as a coda: it might teach the reader what was the inevitable outcome of a life, it's compass needle pointing from Existentialism, to Marxism, then, to the New Left, and finally to technocriticism and political ecology.

Read the book as a fingerpost. ( )

«Μόλις έγινες ογδόντα χρονών. Είσαι ακόμα όμορφη, γοητευτική και επιθυμητή. Πάνε πια πενήντα οκτώ χρόνια που ζούμε μαζί και σ’ αγαπώ περισσότερο από ποτέ. Τελευταία σε ξαναερωτεύτηκα για άλλη μια φορά και έχω πάλι μέσα ένα σπαρακτικό κενό που το γεμίζει μονάχα το σώμα σου αγκαλιασμένο σφιχτά με το δικό μου. Τη νύχτα βλέπω καμιά φορά έναν άντρα, μέσα σ’ ένα έρημο τοπίο, να περπατά σ’ έναν άδειο δρόμο πίσω από μια νεκροφόρα. Είμαι αυτός ο άντρας. Εσένα μεταφέρει η νεκροφόρα. Δεν θέλω να παραβρεθώ στην καύση σου∙ δεν θέλω να παραλάβω ένα δοχείο με τις στάχτες σου. Ακούω τη φωνή της Καθλίν Φεριέ που τραγουδάει “Die Welt ist leer, Ich will nicht leben mehr” και ξυπνάω. Αφουγκράζομαι την αναπνοή σου, το χέρι μου σε αγγίζει. Και οι δύο θα θέλαμε να μην χρειαστεί να ζήσουμε μετά από τον θάνατο του άλλου. Έχουμε πει πολλές φορές ο ένας στον άλλο πως στην απίθανη περίπτωση που θα είχαμε μια δεύτερη ζωή, θα θέλαμε να την περάσουμε μαζί».
( )

D is the André Gorz’s 82-year-old, terminally ill wife, and this short book is a letter written to her about a year before they both committed suicide at the same time, unable to bear the thought of being parted.

It’s a beautiful story, augmented by a few lovely photos of the couple (I wanted more, actually). The telling is often very beautiful and poignant, although occasionally it’s surprisingly long-winded for such a short book, particularly in the parts where he’s examining some hurtful lines he wrote about her in his first book The Traitor. It almost feels sacrilegious to criticise him after all that emotional backstory, but that was my reaction. Another problem I had was that although it’s a letter to D, most of the book is about A, André Gorz. D is praised a lot, but mostly for the way she helped him in his career or in his existential struggles. I didn’t get much sense of what she wanted out of life, other than to be with him.

That said, the beauty outweighs the problems. And Gorz was one of France’s leading 20th-century intellectuals, so there’s plenty of interesting history about intellectual life in mid-century Paris, 1968 etc. Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre figure quite prominently. I related to the couple’s early struggles to be true to their ideals while coping with the practicalities of paying the rent. I liked the way that, over the decades, Gorz came to understand what was truly important in his life, and to let go of so many of the other things that seemed important but weren’t.

In short, it was an excellent book, but not quite the emotional love-letter I had expected. It’s a love-letter written by a philosopher, emotional in places but mostly analytical and contemplative. I read it in one sitting late at night, and would definitely recommend it to others. ( )

Andre Gorz, journalist, activist and pioneer of political ecology writes a long letter about/to his love, his wife, his soul mate, writes about their deep love, their shared life . I read it in one breathless rush, always aware of the fact that only a year after this was first published they decided to take their lives together when she became terminally ill. They simply could not live without one another.