Barthes: «Forme sottili del genere di vita»

Résumé

Barthes: «subtle forms of living»

The issue of life forms is a key point in our present. But it is often reduced to a slogan aiming to make subjects imagine that they can continually choose their lifestyle and identity. Barthes helps us to grasp the ethical significance of the issue of life forms. As a young man, the experience of illness and the sanatorium, with the rhythms created by habits, cures, schedules, food, made him aware of the formality of everyday life. The experience of mourning following the loss of his mother will amplify this awareness, extending it to the formal organisation that a life needs. From Mythologies to the Empire des signes to Roland Barthes par Roland Barthes, up to the Journal de deuil and the last course La préparation du roman, in which the formula ‘formes subtiles du genre de vie’ appears, Barthes’ entire path seems to be marked by the problem of ‘how to live’ and the awareness that it is in the forms of living that an ethical subject emerges.