The problem of classical tragedy after Derrida

Classical tragedies have, since Plato, remained objects of philosophical reception that have not lost their allure throughout the history of philosophy. However, this mode of reception has most often either functioned as a tool used as an antidote to the controversial claims of the Western metaphysical tradition, or it has been transformed into an attempt to produce a kind of counter-metaphysics by thinkers who approach this tradition critically. Both philosophical attitudes, however, largely construct their relation to time, space, and historicity on the basis of sameness and homogeneity, and for this reason, they remain insufficient in establishing a genuine relation to otherness. Yet, to discuss the possibility of a relation with the other requires rendering visible the violence on the linguistic plane that establishes this relation and reevaluating the conceptions of time and space that enable this violence. The ultimate aim of this study is to trace, through Derrida's philosophy, the structures that nourish the Western metaphysical tradition and the space opened to the other on the discursive level in these texts, without positioning classical tragedies as privileged texts. In this framework, the first chapter discusses how classical tragedies have been received in the history of philosophy and which symptoms of the metaphysics of presence are rendered visible through these receptions, around the image of the "specter." In the second chapter, the motivations operating behind these historical receptions are evaluated through Derrida's conceptualization of différance. Taking into account the possibilities opened by this approach -which affirms the infinite deferral of meaning- to other spaces and other temporalities, the third chapter investigates what kind of world classical tragedies construct. In this regard, classical tragedies are reconsidered through the conceptual resources of Derridean philosophy in the context of contemporary philosophical issues such as the hierarchical sequences that structure distinctions between categories, the theme of the supplement, the phenomena of forgiveness and hospitality, the relationship between justice and law, the relation of the sovereign to the law, and the naturalizing tendency of founding performatives. At the background of all these contemporary themes lie metaphysical assumptions sedimented by philosophical history, and this study reveals how classical tragedies at times offer anticipatory critiques of the Western metaphysical tradition, and at other times, contribute assumptions that serve to uphold that very tradition. Keywords: Derrida, Tragedy, Space, Metaphysics of Presence, Différance