Writing Dirty: Paradoxical Embodiments of Nazism in Bataille's "Le Bleu du Ciel"

Since his death in 1962, and particularly in the last twenty-five years, Georges Bataille has become a major figure in intellectual circles. Critics such as Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Julia Kristeva and Philippe Sollers, to name but a few, have all contributed to bringing Bataille's work to the foreground. Regarded as a significant influence on contemporary thought, Bataille is considered a precursor of post-modernism. Yet, while he has received increasing attention, this attention has converged primarily on his essays and philosophical works. As Susann Cockal notes, "specific and detailed readings of many aspects of [his] fiction are still wanting".